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RNI N O. 7 0 4 4 /1961
HATRED!
The Kathua rape, and then murder, of a child have
shaken the nation’s conscience. Every articulate citizen
is asking why we have so much hatred that the body
of an 8-year-old should become a battleground of the
dark forces within us.

8 904150 800010 17
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www.outlookindia.com

O
Volume LVIII, No. 17 Comment

Till Messiah Come, Again

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Rajesh Ramachandran
gROup CREaTIVE DIRECTOR R. prasad
DEpuTY maNagINg EDITOR Sunil menon
CHIEF OF BuREau pranay Sharma
aSST ExECuTIVE EDITOR Satish padmanabhan

P
pOLITICaL EDITOR Bhavna Vij-aurora
WRITERS arindam mukherjee, Lola Nayar,
Qaiser mohammad ali (Senior associate
eople always fall sick. Some recover, but most die. Call it Darwinian cull-
Editors), g.C. Shekhar (associate Editor), ing or God’s ways, but that is life, as we know it. The family, the neighbour-
hood, the society, and even the government are expected to pick up the sick
Dola mitra (Sr asst Editor), pragya Singh,
prachi pinglay-plumber (asst Editors), ajay
Sukumaran, Naseer ganai (Senior Special
Correspondents), arushi Bedi, Siddhartha
and help them back to life. Civilisationally, we are conditioned to give care.
mishra (Correspondents) But what do we do when the entire neighbourhood falls sick? There are
COpY DESk giridhar Jha (Senior Editor),
Sreevalsan Thiyyadi, Saikat Niyogi, Satyadeep
stories and novels on whole villages across rural India falling prey to small
(Sr asst Editors), martand Badoni, Rohan manoj pox, about brave care-givers and braver grave-diggers or pyre-makers. But an
entire city falling sick? Jose Saramago’s stunning work of fiction, Blindness, has an
(Sub Editors)
pHOTOgRapHERS S. Rakshit (Chief photo
Coordinator), Jitender gupta (Deputy photo inexplicable sickness singeing a city. The white sickness or loss of sight for a city’s
populace leads to the collapse of the social order, the takeover of a carnal hierar-
Editor), Tribhuvan Tiwari, Vijay pandey (Chief
photographers), Sandipan Chatterjee,
apoorva Salkade (Sr photographers),
J.S. adhikari (Sr photo Researcher),
chy of cruelty, a complete loss of everything that makes life what it is or the
u. Suresh kumar (Digital Library) destruction of the entire moral universe. An epidemic always threatens a society.
DESIgN Deepak Sharma (Chief art Director),
Saji C.S. (Chief Designer), Sajith kumar (Chief
This is the story of an epidemic reducing a
Illustrator), Leela (Senior Designer), group of people to a bunch of rabid animals.
Hatred is a form of sickness or rather a
Devi prasad, padam gupta (Sr DTp Operators)
DIgITaL anoop george philip (Executive Editor),
aniruddha Dhar (Senior Copy Editor), Thufail p.T. symptom of a grave disease. It primarily con-
sumes the patient, but it can often lead to a
(Senior Correspondent), Rama Dwivedi (Senior
Sub Editor), Yamini kalra (Sub Editor),
Suraj Wadhwa (Chief graphic Designer),
Rupesh malviya (Video Editor)
lot of collateral damage. For instance, a man
EDITORIaL maNagER & CHIEF LIBRaRIaN full of hatred can easily destroy his family, his
alka gupta
colleagues and his workplace, particularly if
BUSINESS OFFICE he is in control. The underlying cause for this
CHIEF ExECuTIVE OFFICER Indranil Roy
puBLISHER Sandip kumar ghosh
kind of hatred is often a deep-rooted sense of
VICE pRESIDENTS abraham uthup, inadequacy and lack of self-esteem and the
Bindu Dhawan, meenakshi akash,
Sam Ben Samuel, Shrutika Dewan patient’s victims are mostly the nicer ones
SR gENERaL maNagERS kabir khattar (Corp), within his closed group.
But what if this assumes the proportions of
V. Sridhar (South)
gENERaL maNagERS Debabani Tagore,
Sasidharan kollery, Shashank Dixit,
Siddhartha Chatterjee, Shailender Vohra,
an epidemic? Visualise a village, a neighbourhood, or a city falling sick with ha-
Sharmistha ghosh tred. Sure, there will be a few care-givers and grave-diggers, but are they enough.
aSSISTaNT gENERaL maNagER
Diwan Singh Bisht
When as a society we lost our mind the last time in 1947, at least a lakh of people
CHIEF maNagER Shekhar kumar pandey were killed and a minimum of 10 lakh people lost their homes. The greatest
maNagERS Shekhar Suvarana, Sudha Sharma
CIRCuLaTION & SuBSCRIpTION Raj kumar
care-giver, the Mahatma, sacrificed himself to keep the nation sane. His sacrifice
mitra, anindya Banerjee, g. Ramesh (South), stopped the madness temporarily, but the cure is still eluding us. It erupts every
Vinod kumar (North), arun kumar Jha (East)
DIgITaL amit mishra
now and then, in some part of the country, when Dalits are flogged, pehlu Khan is
murdered, Akhlaq is lynched. But what happened at Kathua leaves us speechless.
HEAD OFFICE
aB-10, S.J. Enclave, New Delhi - 110 029
An eight-year-old child bore the brunt of a whole society going rabid. partition
Tel: 011-33505500; Fax: 26191420 riots, rapes and the grief of the refugees are memories that have to be exorcised
Customer care helpline: 011-33505533,
33505500 for the benefit of a society that is getting consumed in hatred. The victims of 1947
e-mail: outlook@outlookindia.com
For editorial queries: edit@outlookindia.com
and their children and grandchildren are creating newer victims. This memory of
For subscription helpline: hatred, violence and victimhood has to be removed for this nation to survive.
yourhelpline@outlookindia.com
There is a strange contradiction in our society now. The city now seems to be
OtHEr OFFICES
mumBaI Tel: 022-33545000; Fax: 33545100
saner and more caring than the hateful village. Are all the inadequacies of rural
CaLCuTTa Tel: 033 46004506; Fax: 033 46004506 deprivation being channelled into hatred? Sure, our villages were always back-
CHENNaI Tel: 42615224, 42615225; Fax: 42615095 ward, regressive, superstitious and terribly hierarchical, but were they this hate-
ful? or are the agents of hatred fanning the fire of communal strife especially in
BaNgaLORE Tel: 080-43715021
printed and published by Indranil Roy on
behalf of Outlook publishing (India) pvt. Ltd. the fertile soil of our villages and small towns? If so, that fire will extinguish all of
Editor: Rajesh Ramachandran. printed at
International print-O-pac Ltd, C 4-C 11, us. A raging fire knows no communal divide.
phase-II, Noida and published from aB-10,
S.J. Enclave, New Delhi-110 029
A messiah had come and been packed off, and we keep killing each other waiting
published for the week of april 24-30, 2018
for the next. let us try and heal ourselves. At the very least, let a child be just that,
Released on april 21, 2018
a child, and not a context for competitive communal conquests.
Total no. of pages 76, Including Covers Rajesh Ramachandran

30 April 2018 OutlOOk 3

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INTERNATIONAL
‘Moral superpower’ Sweden
shouldn’t forget Nehru,
Gandhis in its eagerness
to sign deals
by ASHOK SWAIN

NATIONAL
“Hang rapists”: The easy way
LEGAL SHUTDOWN Jammu lawyers protest the arrest of the Kathua case accused out for a society and
politicians who don’t
want change
14 Uncle Bam At It Again by AAKAR PATEL
The US drops missiles on Syria citing an old excuse—chemical weapons. The move is
bound to shape the biggest geopolitical conflict in definitive ways.

16 Strained River of Opportunity

Politics finds opportunity in conflict, more so when history has an example in the
adversary having won the plot. The Cauvery issue is DMK’s weapon this time around.

32 The Horror Normative Indian monsoon is recovering

Everyday, we live with bits of violence—rapes, rioting and lynchings reported regularly. Then after decades of decline
by OUTLOOK WEB BUREAU
something like Kathua happens, shattering the normal, revealing the amount of hatred around.

56 Viral Perception
India has reported a considerable drop in HIV cases, but the stigma around it is still strong

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The latest action flick Baaghi 2 sees phenomenal success at the box office and possibly
ushers in an era of a new dance-action star—the lithe and agile Tiger Shroff FEATURE
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 letters
A New Gaze At Patriarchy
ON E-MAIL Padmini Raghavendra:
This is with reference to your cover
story titled The Rising And The
Anxious Male (April 16). A sexist
attitude is something that has been an
inherent part of the Indian problem
when it comes to dealing with sexual
harassment. In so many liberal colleges
across India, stories of sexual abuse
and harassment have done the rounds
as hushed whispers between colleagues
and students. That people are abused
is routine. That nothing much is
done about it is also routine. Only
a part of the whole picture has now
been revealed by students and others
concerned. My question is: why, as a
society, are we still making excuses
for sexual predators and why are uni-
versities and college campuses, places
which spearhead change, independent
of thought and action, festering in this
exploitative environment?
MUSCAT Ramachandran Nair:
Sexuality is not something that can
simply be hidden from the rest of the
world, especially in our contemporary
environment. We need to confront it,
and deal with it. In the present-day
context, the extensive use of electronic
and social media has ensured that the
dirt that was hiding behind veneers
of public conduct has become known
to everyone. Women have been
mistreated for various reasons for
years, decades and centuries. The times
are changing. Women today are having
none of it and are using tools at their
disposal, like social media, to expose
the misogynists. And the opposite
gender cannot tolerate their growth in
perception, leading to a huge gender
conflict. But using social media as a
weapon of change has its perils. The
language used there is often extremely
nasty. It’s quite surprising that edu-
cated people can be seen using filthy
one-liner
HYDERABAD Shishir Prabhu
History is a graveyard of several failed due processes, that is why the present is so turbulent.
6 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
April 16, 2018
words and expressions in this platform
to strike back even in sincere-sounding
discussions. It seems that violence onl-
ine has a way of possessing all sorts of
people. Virtual harassment has become
a commonplace thing. Unfortunately,
no one is going to win this fight.
LUCKNOW M.C. Joshi: Sexual abuse
is a reality in not only Indian institu-
tions and workplaces but in Indian soc-
iety as a whole. It’s hardly a rare thing
to learn of incidents of sexual abuse in
families and households. Yet, the law
against harassment is paradoxical in
the sense that the one of the very basic
principles of jurisprudence—“innocent
till proven guilty”—is upturned to
“guilty till proven innocent”, and this
provides enough room for ‘using’ the
law against males. For, the sole proof
of the alleged offence accepted by the
court is the version of the accusing
women. Agreed, there is a legal process
too, which will determine if the
allegations are genuine or not—still,
the law seems to suffer from a kind of
asymmetry. There cannot be one law
for victims of sexual harassment and
another for the victims of other crimes,
as is the case right now. The case of the
poet-anthologist illustrates the cause
for ambivalence: the complainant
was herself not sure whether her case
would stand legal scrutiny and resorted
to talk about her alleged harassment
through a Facebook post. Though
disclosure was followed by no legal
action, the damage was done—without
the poet getting a chance to defend
himself on the issue, many of his
colleagues pronounced him guilty. That
is why a number of poets pulled out of
an anthology he was editing.
Train In
ON E-MAIL Vasudha Saralaya: The
Singapore Diary by Giridhar Jha (April
9) made for good reading. But justice
cannot be done to Singapore without
a mention of their MRT system—the
cheapest and best mode of transport
within the city state. You can never get
lost within the maze, what with lucid
signboards, crisp announcements and
the ever-helpful people of the country.
Walk Back
ON E-MAIL Vijai Pant: This
is with reference to the story on
cricket’s periodic encounters with its
non-gentlemanly side, in the light of the
recent ball-tampering fiasco (Blongers
Must Walk, Apr 9). Truth is, all crick-
eting nations now play the hard way.
Moreover, crass commercialisation of
the game has further made it extremely
tempting for the unscrupulous. There is
often more to the unexpected outcome
of a match than meets the eye. Even
before the recent incident smeared
their image, Australians have been at
the forefront of those who tarnished the
 INBOXED

game, introducing the world to terms Conveniently Imagined

like ‘sledging’. This ‘win at any cost’
attitude has now brought them to a pass
where even its political establishment
was left red-faced. Let us hope that the
guilt-ridden, moist eyes of its erstwhile
captain and vice-captain while facing
the press will prove to be a point of
catharsis which Australian cricket so
badly needs. Only time will tell whether
cricketers will turn a new leaf or
continue tampering with the game.
Fire & Ashes
ON E-MAIL J.S. Acharya: This is
about the article on the communal
clashes in Bengal’s Ranigunj and
Asansol areas around the Ram Navami
celebrations and the politics the BJP
and the Trinamool are playing over
them (At The Fire Ceremonies, April 16).
The political kerfuffle in West Bengal
over the BJP’s observance of Ram
Navami and the TMC’s equally spirited
celebration of Annapurna Puja would
not have taken this ugly form had both
parties proceeded with circumspection.
Religious fervour was reduced to a
malodorous thing. As an astute leader,
ON E-MAIL Dr Sylvia Karpagam: The article
by sociologist Shiv Visvanathan, The Chilly justice
of the Gulag, in Outlook’s issue on the ‘gender war’
is a revealing indictment of all that is wrong with
the Indian academia. Throughout the article, the
writer skilfully weaves the narrative of a nobler
era, where issues were challenged “by weaving
the personal and political into a tapestry of radi-
calism”. He romanticises some fantasy past filled
with joy, freedom and an enlightened ability to talk and live with difference.
The current generation, however, is described with words like “essentialist”,
seeking “instant resolution”, and “wanting justice as instant gratification”
while offering “little proof because they think proof is unnecessary”. It is as
though niceness and rationale froze to a halt with the author’s generation,
and subsequently became filled with feminist landmines that ‘old-school’
men have to now tiptoe through. For a start, relationships in universities and
academic spaces are not cosy little “man-woman relationship” spaces. They
are spaces of extreme imbalance in power—of gender, of religion and caste
and culture, to name a few.
At no point does the writer stand in solidarity with any woman on the
list, as though it is a given that they are untruthful. It is also curious that he
takes great care to mention that the academics mentioned in the list were
‘outstanding’—it somehow implies that being outstanding carries with it
some intrinsic impunity against ordinary laws and rules.
The institution can be a sacred space to many, a key to escape from gener-
ations of poverty and oppression. To reduce those to spaces of man-woman
relationships and upholding that as its primary value is trivialising the
aspirations of thousands of women.
(PS: This comes from a doctor and researcher who neither identifies as older
or younger generation and who, incidentally, also put a name on the Raya
Sarkar list following total failure of ‘due process’ over a twenty-year period.)

LIFE CRIES The aftermath in Ranigunj
Mamata Banerjee would surely have
noted last year’s tensions around Ram
Navami and didn’t want to miss out on
this year’s. No wonder, the RSS is happy
with what has transpired in Bengal.
From Bad to Worse
NOIDA Bal Govind: Amidst the
NPA problems in the banking sector,
precipitated by the Nirav Modi scam,
the issue of corporate governance
has hit the country’s private banks,
which once used to be the darlings of
investors (Grease Is Best Kept Private,
April 16). As for the ICICI issue over
Videocon-NuPower, that bank’s board
has defended its head Chanda Kochhar,
but its investors are naturally becoming

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30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 7

 letters
restless as days pass. Axis Bank, under
Shikha Sharma, too has been hit by
some bad news or the other in the last
few months. From money-laundering
charges during demonetisation in
November 2016 to under-reporting
bad loans and insider trading charges,
things have worsened during her
tenure. The gross NPAs of Axis Bank
have increased from Rs 915 crore to
Rs 25,000 crore from 2009 to 2017. If
that is not a strong enough reason for a
change at the top, I don’t know what is.
MUMBAI K.P. Rajan:
From the deplorable events unfolding
before the nation—the colossal frauds
being committed by the so-called
“efficient” private sector banks like
ICICI, Axis and Yes Bank—one can very
well come to the conclusion that audit/
vigilance departments in banks, inc-
luding those in the RBI, the regulator
of banks and financial institutions in
the country, have been in hibernation
for a very long time. The RBI should
be held wholly responsible for the
ever-increasing NPAs, running into
thousands of crores in private as well
as public sector banks since it failed to
check the mounting loans. Customer
confidence in banks is at a nadir in the
country right now. As a retired senior
citizen, I don’t think I see a ray of hope
for the future of banking.
Blue Streak
ON E-MAIL K.R. Srinivasan: With
reference to A Very Blue Tangle (April
16), the Supreme Court’s observation
that no automatic arrests should be
made under the SC and ST (Prevention
of Atrocities) Act before a mandatory
probe is carried out is appropriate and
only serves the interests of justice. But
what is shocking is the aftermath: the
protests and the crackdown on them,
which has resulted in the death of nine
people as well as large-scale violence
and destruction of property across
the country, with north Indian states
bearing the brunt. In this context,
Dalit anger is justifiable because, even
with the strict provisions in the SC/ST
Act already in force, the community
is vulnerable to frequent attacks by
caste Hindus. Further, the fear that
any dilution of the provisions of the
Act will only result in more attacks
and suppression of their rights is not
8 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
unfounded. Therefore, the protests
are justifiable, but not the violence.
Violence only breeds hatred and makes
the situation go from bad to worse.
With all that said, it is baffling that the
opposition is targeting the Centre,
knowing full well that the observation
that the Act needs to be amended
was made by the court to prevent its
misuse. As usual, politicians are fishing
in troubled waters to consolidate Dalit
votes by creating a Dalit–upper caste
divide, rather than ensuring that Dalits
get social justice. Only time will tell
whether the observations made by the
apex court are correct or an overreach.
ON E-MAIL K.S. Jayatheertha: The
nationwide protest by Dalits signals a
degree of collective assertion by one
of the most oppressed groups in the
country. But why have they mobilised
BHIM TEAM Dalits protest in Jodhpur
on this scale only for the SC/ ST Act?
Why not also for incidents such as
when ‘gau rakshaks’ thrashed several
Dalit men for allegedly skinning a dead
cow, and even filmed the atrocity? In
October 2017, Gujarat saw the ‘mous-
tache protest’ after two Dalit men were
beaten up for sporting moustaches, the
symbol of ‘upper-caste’ masculinity,
and shortly after the incidents, a
Dalit man was lynched for watching a
garba event. There has been no action
so far against the leaders accused of
inciting violence when Hindutva forces
decided to attack Dalits gathering in
Maharashtra to mark the anniversary
of the Battle of Koregaon. The Maratha
protests organised across the state,
which saw the government agreeing
to look into their grievances, also had
a strong anti-Dalit undercurrent, with
one of their main demands being the
scrapping of the Atrocities Act.
Tactful Acts
ON E-MAIL M.S. Khokhar:
This refers to The Old Sport Of
Goodwill Hunting, your story analysing
the recent meeting between the
premières of India and Nepal (April
16). It will be in India’s interest to build
good relations with Nepal. Even though
India views Nepal PM Oli as pro-China,
his visit is an opportunity for India to
mend relations which have gone awry
in the last half-decade. India should
also keep in mind that China is eyeing
Nepal as a potential investment zone
and it is inevitable that the Chinese will
start some projects there, the dragon
is, after all, Nepal’s other big neighbour.
So if China builds a hydropower project
in Nepal,India should be offering to
buy the power the project generates
instead of sulking with envy. If there
are lessons from India’s engagement
with Nepal over the last four years, it is
not to make crude demands on loyalty
based on the size of the neighbour, but
to acknowledge the agency of the other
and offer a fair friendship deal.
Fake Nukes
PUNE Anil S.: Fake news laws in
our post-truth world, a convenient
oxymoron indeed (Fake News Busters,
April 16). But you have to give credit
to the I&B minister for bringing in
the short-lived rule as it would have
been the ultimate weapon to seek and
destroy the remaining journalists and
media organisations in the country not
influenced or ‘inspired’ by the current
government. Alas, this is technically
a democracy, so the prudent prime
minister got the order retracted swiftly.
Someone should tell minister Irani that
you don’t use a nuke until you are abso-
lutely losing the war. But I do wonder
if an even hand were to back this rule,
even if it would have lasted for a week,
the number of journos—‘well-con-
nected’ editors, maverick TV anchors,
new media moguls—to lose their
accreditation would be stupendous.
SECUNDERABAD Raj Mohan:
The attempt of the I&B minister was to
fetter the press and harass journalists
by means of the fake news order (Fake
News Busters, April 16). The objective
of this government is to make the
media of a country its caged bird. As it
is, parrots abound in its landscape.
deep throat
golden oldies
Bengal CPI(M) leaders are
annoyed with reports that the
party is full of oldies. Since
clashes began with the ruling
TMC, almost all top CPI(M)
leaders have taken to the
streets. Pointing to recent pho­
tos of the police dragging away
a young party worker during
the nomination process for
panchayat polls, a veteran obs­
erved, “We are a party full of
young blood, but even the older
members are not afraid to go
out and protest. Perhaps you
see our older ones more as they
are more spirited than those in
other parties.” The veteran was
referring to the way both the
big national parties have side­
lined their senior leaders.
OVERHEARD Rattled by Smriti Irani’s frequent trips to Amethi, Rahul Gandhi recently spent
three days there, accompanied by his mother Sonia Gandhi, who held a janata durbar in Rae Bareli.
a freebie hunt
It hasn’t been easy for the Election
Commission to keep tabs on free-
bies to woo voters in poll-bound
Karnataka. And it isn’t just about
the tangibles on offer—the parties
are also sponsoring lavish meals,
wedding receptions and temple
festivals. Loads of mutton and
chicken are flying off the shelves,
but the EC’s teams are finding it
difficult to link the rising sales to
parties luring voters. Demand for
gold and silver ornaments has also
gone up, but that’s being attrib-
uted to the Akshaya Tritiya festi-
val. Joint teams of the EC,
Karnataka Police and the Income
Tax department have so far seized
over Rs 25 crore in cash, gold and
silver valued at Rs 10 crore, 35,000
litres of liquor worth Rs 2 crore
and 160 laptops, besides saris and
pressure cookers.
the useful miner
Bellary mining magnate G.
Janardhana Reddy has been
making the odd public appear­
ance over the past year—first,
at a music album launch, then a
hospital visit to meet the young
man bashed up by a Congress
MLA’s son in Bangalore. Now,
the BJP is fielding his brother
Somashekar as a candidate in
Bellary city. Janardhana, who
has been barred from entering
Bellary, is reportedly moving to
neighbouring Chitradurga to
help with close friend B.
Sreeramulu’s campaign there.
The BJP typically glosses over
its Reddy connection, given the
mining scam. But, hey, it’s an
election and the party can use
all the help it can get.
30 April 2018 OutlOOk 9

THE SUBCONTINENTAL MENU
ASSES CURE
ASTHMA
T HE ass is a panacea. It’s
been believed that its
milk is useful for dealing
with snake bites, liver prob-
lems and even bronchitis.
Its skin is used in Chinese
medicine as a “blood tonic”
for certain conditions, such
as anaemia. And now, Indians have “discovered” that
consuming its meat will cure asthma and snoring.
This misinformation (which butchers display openly
CORPORATE JET SET
I T’S good to plan ahead for the
summer. Accompanied by their
families, corporators of the Mira-
Bhayander (Maharashtra) Munic-
ipal Corporation recently enjoyed
a six-day sojourn in Nainital. The
ostensible purpose of the Rs 10-lakh
mission: visit the local municipality
(the remaining time was for sightsee-
ing). Another set will fly to Coorg in
May for a four-day visit costing about
Rs 45 lakh. Yet another group will
K INGSHIP often came with
head to Darjeeling and Sikkim’s cap-
ital Gangtok—the dates aren’t fixed,
but Rs 10 lakh has been set aside.
Meanwhile, the citizens these corpo-
rators represent are struggling with
increased property and water taxes,
while outdoor fumigation has been
halted due to a lack of funds. The
corporation’s Congress members are
boycotting the tours, the killjoys!
12 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
IN & AROUND
on boards) has led to a
massacre of the animals
in Andhra Pradesh and
Telangana. Doctors have
reportedly dismissed these
ideas as “baseless rumours”
with no support from any
scientific study, but it seems
that many are yet to get the
message. Donkey meat is
currently being sold openly for Rs 400–500 per kg—
violating the norms of the Food Safety and Standards
Authority of India, which does not classify it as edible.
LEGENDS FROM
THE WAQFNAMA
I N response to the Uttar Pradesh
Sunni Waqf Board’s claim that it
owns the Taj Mahal due to a charita-
ble donation (waqf) by Shah Jahan,
the Supreme Court has asked the
board to produce the relevant waqf-
SOMA FOR nama (deed declaring the donation)
THE POLL GODS signed by the 17th-century Mughal
emperor. A bench headed by Chief
obligations to conduct
rituals and sacrifices. Now this
Justice Dipak Misra asked, “Who in
India will believe that it [Taj] belongs
has devolved upon our chief to the Waqf Board,” and enjoined
ministers. Leaders of the the board’s counsel to “show us the
Telangana Rashtra Samithi are signature.” The hearing took place as
pressuring CM K. Chandrase- part of an appeal filed by the Archae-
khar Rao to perform a yaaga ological Survey of India in 2010, in
for victory in the 2019 response to the Waqf Board declar-
assembly elections. It certainly ing the site its property in 2005.
seemed to work last time,
The counsel asked for more time
when he conducted a five-day
to produce the documents—presu-
Ayutha Chandi Mahaa Yaaga in
2015 before the Hyderabad
mably, 352 years weren’t enough.
municipal elections; the party
went from zero seats to 99,
and thanked the yaaga’s
“favourable stars”. The CM has
been performing yaagas since
the Telangana statehood
agitation. But has anyone been
keeping count? If he completes
100, he won’t just be king—
tradition has it that he will be
equal to Indra shatakratu, the
lord of 100 sacrifices. Perhaps
the opposition should pray for
a Vamana to stop him.
Illustrations by SAJITH KUMAR
THE UNCHECKED COST OF A CHEQUE

T ELANGANA is giving
farmers cheques that
for Rs 100. The process
of printing the cheques
aren’t worth the paper
they’re written on—litera-
turned out to be expen-
sive, working out to
No Sullan Retirement

lly. The state government’s
Rythu Bandhu scheme
pledges to give financial
assistance of Rs 4,000 per
acre of land to
every farmer. A
farmer with one
gunta of land (1/40
of an acre) will thus
receive a cheque
WICKET-KEEPER’S THIRD SLIP
F
Rs 140 per leaf, because ORMER military dictator Pervez Musharraf, the most
each one includes many of powerful man in Pakistan barely a decade ago, is now
the beneficiary’s details as one of the most controversial individuals in the country.
well as the government’s The list of charges levelled against Musharraf in his
logo etc. About 60 own country never seems to end. They have ranged from
lakh farmers are to treason for sacking senior judges to other misdemeanours
receive the cheques, while in power. Now he is being accused of handing over
with distribution in Pakistanis to foreigners in exchange for currency.
phases from April 19 Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal, chairman of the National
to May 31. Accountability Bureau (NAB) and president of the National
Commission for Enforced Disappearances, said on Monday
that, during Musharraf’s regime, over 4,000 Pakistanis
were handed over to foreigners for US dollars.
The News International reported that, while briefing
the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Human
Rights over the issue of missing persons, Iqbal said that

A
70 per cent of the missing
FGHANISTAN wicket-keeper Moham- individuals were involved in ‘mil- Under
med Shahzad can’t keep out of trouble, it itancy’, and that recovered indi-
Musharraf,
seems. Shortly after he completed a one-year viduals were often unwilling to
over 4,000
share details because they “were
doping ban and rejoined his country’s side too scared to open up about their Pakistanis
during a tour of Zimbabwe, he earned a two- experiences.” Iqbal deplored the were allegedly
match suspension for slamming his bat on the cause of this fear, arguing that handed over to
ground when he was dismissed. And now he “a terrorist’s family should not foreigners for
be labelled terrorists.” US dollars.
has been caught playing for a Pakistani club Musharraf created history a
Musharraf has
in a tournament in Peshawar without the few years ago when he became
supposedly
the first senior general in the
required ‘no objection certificate’ from the country to be put on trial for admitted it.
Afghanistan Cricket Board. Ordered to pay a treason. Interestingly, he was
fine of 3,00,000 Afghanis (about Rs 2,80,130), charged not for the military coup he staged to oust Nawaz
Sharif in 1999, but for dismissing a number of sitting
Shahzad will have to return to Afghanistan. judges by declaring a state of emergency.
Ultimately, the army and the judiciary reached a
compromise that allowed them to avoid embarrassment by
letting Musharraf go to the UAE to see his ‘ailing mother’.
SPOTTED: PILLION WITH PAWS When he returned home a few years later, he was quietly

A
leopard took a
motorcycle ride to
hospital in UP’s Maharaj-
ganj district recently. Two
forest department emp-
loyees found the animal
lying unconscious and
informed a ranger, who
quickly arrived on the
scene with his assistants.
The ranger called for a
cage to take the leopard to
a veterinary hospital, but
there was a risk that wait-
ing too long would prove
fatal for the animal. Thus,
two of the staff lifted it
onto a motorcycle and
transported it, heedless
of personal risk. The DFO
was reported as saying
that the big cat responded
well to treatment, and
that they were trying to
find out why leopards
were getting sick—ano-
ther one was found dead
in the area last month.
encouraged to retire into a quiet life.
The current charges are no less serious.
Iqbal said that, during Musharraf’s tenure, the then inte-
rior minister Aftab Sherpao handed over 4,000 Pakistanis
to foreigners. He added that Musharraf had himself admit-
ted to having done so and that Parliament did not raise its
voice against the former president and interior minister.
“He should have been questioned according to [sic] which
law he handed people to foreign elements,” Iqbal added.
The NAB chairman linked these “foreign elements” to
foreign NGOs working in Pakistan, adding, “These NGOs
are working for foreign elements...If I had the authority, I
would have placed a ban on the organisations.”

30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 13

 CHEMICAL ALLEY
by Pranay Sharma
I
F it was meant to rally world opin-
ion behind the prompt punishment
meted out by three leading West-
ern democracies to Syrian Presi-
dent Bashar al-Assad’s murderous
regime and for his predilection for
using chemical weapons on his own
people, the script seems to have gone
quite awry.
Instead of cheering the US and its two
NATO allies—the UK and France—for
their April 14 missile attacks on Syria,
the motives for their action are being
questioned around the world. Were they
aimed more at saving their own proxies
in the Syrian conflict? Was it also a
response born out of their respective
domestic compulsions? Or was it the
plight of hapless civilians in this strife-
torn nation that forced their hand?
Even though Donald Trump pro-
claimed ‘Mission Accomplished’ after
the missile strikes—shadowing another
such dubious declaration 13 years
ago—serious doubts remain on whether
chemical weapons were indeed used on
civilians on April 7 in Douma and, if so, if
it was actors other than the Syrian army
who were behind these dastardly acts.
The US-UK combine is perhaps not
the best entity to convince people about
the veracity of a chemical weapons
attack, since the world, and especially
West Asia, still has fresh memories
14 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
Photographs: AP
of their bogus claims of WMDs in the US and its Western allies on Kashmir,”
possession of Saddam Husain’s regime says former Indian diplomat Talmiz
to justify their 2003 invasion of Iraq. Ahmad. “There is no reason to feel com-
Several hundred sea- and air-launched placent that it may never happen again
missiles were shot at Syria, apparently in future,” he adds.
targeting the government’s chemical The Organisation for the Prevention of
weapons facilities. But none were aimed Chemical Weapons—the international
at either Russian or Iranian assets in body in The Hague to deal with cases of
Syria, even though the two countries are use of chemical weapons—has formed a
regularly pilloried for being the main fact-finding team to investigate devel-
backers of Assad. Syria says only three opments in Syria. Indian ambassador
people were injured in the attacks. Venu Rajamony says, “The alleged use of
Amidst claims and counter-claims by chemical weapons, if true, is deplorable.
the major actors in Syria, analysts and We call for an impartial and objective
reporters are trying to cut through the investigation by the OPCW.”
thicket of ‘fake news’ and orchestrated But neither the US nor the UK or
propaganda to get to the raw, unvar- France was in a mood to wait for the
nished truth, which is elusive as ever. OPCW’s final report. They felt they had
“The information war has been eleva- enough ‘evidence’ to act unilaterally.
ted beyond the status of an adjunct to Interestingly, all three, as well as most
the conflict on the ground to the point Western opinion-makers, appear to
where it is now a key and crucial front rely on information provided by Syrian
in itself,” says an independent observer. rebels and opposition outfits of Assad’s
For many countries, including India, use of chemical weapons on civilians.
the developments in Syria have import- According to the BBC, “Activists from
ant lessons. One, ‘fake’ news on WMD the Violations Documentation Centre
attacks on civilians can lead to a larger (VDC), which records alleged violations
military conflict in the region. Two, any of international law in Syria, reported two
country that resists the line of the US and separate incidents of bombs believed to
its allies may come under huge pressure contain toxic substances being dropped
and unwelcome scrutiny. India may not by the Syrian air force” in the town of
be a pushover, but the unquestionable Douma in East Ghouta, the rebel-held
faith some of its policy planners seem to area to the southwest of Damascus.
have in the US needs a reality check. But the VDC, a Switzerland-registered
“In the not too distant past, we have human rights body operating in rebel-
faced such malicious propaganda by the controlled Syria, had been citing reports
For That
Whiff Of
Chlorine
The US-led missile assault on
Syria was based on dubious
information. India should be wary
of such pious, dangerous outbursts. Left, A US missile streaks the Damascus night sky on April 14;
top, the destroyed Syrian Scientific Research Centre in Barzeh

from the Syria Civil Defence—whose a ‘chemical attack’ would necessitate) shock waves among US allies, especially
workers, known as ‘White Helmets’, while ferrying victims to hospitals. Saudi Arabia, which naturally feared an
have a dubious track record. The White “Either the chemical weapons attack in outcome in favour of its rival Iran.
Helmets emerged at a time when opp- Douma is nonsense or Bashar al-Assad is Conveniently for many, reports of
osition fighters were under pressure the stupidest man on the planet,” writes the chemical weapons attack came at a
from government forces, say observers. John Wright in Sputnik International. juncture when the Syrian army is in the
Furthermore, these volunteers have only He argues, “Simply, because the poten- ascendant. For regional US allies, it was
worked in rebel-held areas and are seen tial consequences attached to Syrian important to ensure America does not
to be closely linked with the Al Qaeda- military forces carrying out such an take its eyes off Syria. Observers also
affiliate in Syria, Jabhat Nusra. They attack...would be catastrophic.” pointed out domestic compulsions in
supplied most of the information about As the argument goes, the Syrian army, the three nations that prompted these
the two-day use of chemical weapons and generously backed by Russia, was already leaders to take action.
its effect on hapless civilians, especially heading towards ‘complete success’ in “Trump has his hands full with the
women and children. East Ghouta and did not need chemical various allegations about his many
According to the VDC, more than 500 weapons. Douma remained under the transgressions; including his having
patients were brought to hospitals in the control of Saudi-backed Jaish al-Islam been in collusion with Putin et al,” says
rebel-held areas. “The patients showed and other Salafi groups, particularly C. Uday Bhaskar, director of Society for
signs of ‘respiratory distress, central Jabhat Nusra. Russia recently brokered Policy Studies.
cyanosis (blue skin or lips), excessive oral a deal for these fighters to move out with Likewise, British PM Theresa May is
foaming, corneal burns, and the emission their families to other safer areas. battling the Brexit fiasco and a revolt
of chlorine-like odour’, One woman But there was a split within the Jaish within her own party, and French pre-
who died had convulsions and pinpoint al-Islam, between those who wanted sident Emmanuel Macron is facing
pupils,” it said. While the initial figure of peace and move out and those who unrest over his economic policy—both
deaths from these attacks was put at 150, wanted to stay and fight. This also coi- have enough reason to use such safe,
later it was brought down to 70; finally, ncided with Trump’s announcement in diversionary tactics.
the agreed figure seems to be 43 deaths. late March that the US would withdraw For Trump, who had been talking of a
However, all the graphic description of its troops from Syria soon, sending detente with Russia, the challenge—to
suffering meets with scepticism. Russian come out tough against Syria and Russia
officials and other independent sources while under pressure from hardline US
who visited Douma claimed hospitals The proof of the attacks establishment—is stiffer. But significa-
and doctors there did not report any VDC offered to the West ntly, despite the anti-Moscow rhetoric,
case of treating victims of chemical came from the White US and Western missiles carefully avo-
weapons attacks. Instead, they pointed ided Russian assets in Syria. If punitive
out that video clips posted by the Syrian
Helmets, who’re closely tactics have real bite, they may not have
rebels showed White Helmet volunteers allied to Al Qaeda such a tame ending. They evidently heed
without any protective gear (which affiliate Jabhat Nusra. Russia’s rising note of displeasure. O

30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 15

 RIVER ROW
The Beneficial
Distributaries
Cauvery may have been the stated cause but DMK
has a more mundane agenda: increase its Delta votes
by G.C. Shekhar in Chennai
M
.K. Stalin was a tired man
after trudging through the
Cauvery delta for almost a
week for what he said was a
bid to retrieve the river. The
65-year-old DMK leader, who
is considered to be among the fitter of
the regional leaders of Tamil Nadu,
kept ducking into the air-conditioned
tempo traveller after walking a few
hundred meters under an unkind sun.
The self-inflicted ordeal was part of a
crafty political calculation DMK patria-
rch M. Karunanidhi’s son had come up in
the face of a criticism: that he’s not suffi-
ciently savvy to exploit the troubles of the
16 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
SET CMB M.K. Stalin at a rally in
Chennai, demanding a Cauvery board
“Because Cauvery became a dispute in
ruling AIADMK. “Stalin needed to send
out his own political message to prove
that he has come out of his father’s
shadow and also enthuse DMK cadres
with a road show that had an emotive
appeal,” explains DMK spokesperson K.S.
Radhakrishnan. “The Centre played into
his hands by delaying the Cauvery
Management Board—and Stalin lunged
at it and proved his political mettle.” The
Cauvery outreach eventually proved to be
a bigger success than anticipated, with
farmers lining up en route to greet Stalin.
The DMK working president could have
remained satisfied with the April 5 bandh
demanding the immediate formation of a
Cauvery Management Board. That pro-
test had seen the state grind to a halt—and
Photographs: PTI
the DMK could claim credit for bringing
together the Opposition and farmers’
outfits in organising the bandh. But the
DMK scion needed to keep the Cauvery
pot boiling as long as it was possible. “One
main reason is guilt,” reasons political
commentator Raveenthran Duraisamy.
1974 when the DMK was ruling and
Karunanidhi was the chief minister. His-
tory shows that Tamil Nadu’s claim got
compromised at this stage. So Stalin had
to atone for his father’s mistake. He clev-
erly used the present crisis to emerge as
the saviour of Cauvery and farmers.”
Stalin also had an electoral reason to hit
the road: to improve the DMK’s electoral
prospects in the delta that used to be its
stronghold before AIADMK supremo J.
Jayalalitha made inroads into this fertile
belt in east-central Tamil Nadu. To illus-
trate, in the 2016 assembly elections the
DMK won only 19 assembly seats com-
pared to the AIADMK’s 29 in the eight
districts of the delta. That time, the DMK
could not play the Cauvery card in the
delta districts, as people saw Jayalalitha
as the protagonist in getting the tribunal’s
 RI VER ROW

MODI GO BACK Tamil outfits protest

against the PM’s April 12 Chennai visit

final award notified in the central gazette

after a prolonged legal battle. So the
present context was an ideal opportunity
to shore up the DMK’s popular base here.
Stalin also realised that Cauvery was a
great leveller—especially when the delta
is thirsty—and parties would find it diffi-
cult to resist its political appeal. So, along
with the Congress, he grafted the CPI and
CPI(M)—besides a few smaller parties—
into his journey, hoping that this would
crystalise into a firm political front for the
coming elections. The CPI has anyway
lost its following among the farmhands in
the delta, while the CPI(M)’s clout has
thinned to the industrial labour around
Tiruchi. So both Communist parties prove their nuisance value by demon- with cadre-based political parties. Most
readily jumped onto Stalin’s bandwagon, strating their capacity to disrupt the of them have no second-line leadership to
hoping to revive their traditional roots. tournament. The IPL’s decision to move sustain the fight if the leader gets jailed.”
out all future matches from Chennai While the fringe might celebrate the

S
TALIN, while terming the Centre proved that their blackmail had worked. IPL shifting base, what it has failed to
and the BJP as the villain in the But Velmurugan argues that the IPL notice is the bad name such protests have
Cauvery denouement, conveniently matches were wrongly timed. “When the brought to Tamil Nadu, particularly its
hid from public view that it’s not the Telangana agitation was in full flow, the capital. “Chennai would not be viewed as
saffron party that administers the only IPL matches were moved out of Andhra a preferred choice for international
two states opposing the formation of the Pradesh (in 2010). Moreover, IPL is mere tournaments after the IPL fiasco,” says
CMB. Karnataka has a Congress regime, gambling with official sanction,” he adds. Congress leader Karate Thiagarajan,
while a Left alliance rules Kerala. “This Such hit-and-run tactics of the fringe who also heads the Karate Association of
crucial fact has been drowned in all the parties, though, cannot be equated with India. “After all the preparations that go
din the DMK has managed to whip up,” that of political parties, argue mainstream into a tournament, a fringe leader’s whim
notes BJP spokesperson K.T. Raghavan. politicians. “The fringe groups need one disrupts a match at the last minute! This
By staking his political future on the protest after another to keep their cadres is hardly the right advertisement for a
week-long tour, Stalin had hoped to dic- engaged and hog the headlines. They beh- vibrant and economically active city.”
tate the political discourse on Cauvery. ave like guerrilla groups indulging in The April 10 protests were followed by
Unfortunately for him, a bunch of fringe urban warfare,” says former DMK minis- black-flag demonstrations against Prime
parties spoilt his trip by targeting an IPL ter Thangam Thennarasu. “But a political Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Che-
match at Chennai on April 10 and con- party like ours, with a long history, cannot nnai two days later, when he came for
verting it into a prestige battle. Led by the behave similarly. That is the reason our the Defence Expo. That once again dis-
call given by T. Velmurugan who heads a leader distanced himself from the pro- rupted life across the metropolis. But the
fringe party called TVK, other groups tests against the IPL since the focus on BJP countered it by saying that while a
latched on, questioning the logic in Cauvery should not be diluted.” few hundred cadres turned up for the
Chennai hosting cricket matches when a The fringe also stood exposed as Seeman protests, tens of thousand people lined
fight for the CMB was being waged across had to disown some of his own cadres up to visit the expo and toured the war-
the state. So the city witnessed cadres of after they were shown assaulting uni- ships anchored. “These are the real
VCK, actor-director Seeman’s Naam formed cops. It led actor Rajnikanth to Tamils and Indians,” gushes BJP spokes-
Thamizhar Katchi and call for stricter laws to man Thirupathi Narayanan. “Obviously,
even filmmakers battling punish those attacking they outnumbered those shouting slo-
police cordons to lay siege men in khaki. “Once the gans. It only proves that a silent majority
to the Chepauk stadium,
The fringe may police arrested more than will always have the last say against the
notwithstanding the fact celebrate the two dozen of his followers, vocal minority.”
that over 20,000 fans had IPL shifting Seeman quickly backed There remains the larger question: will
turned up at the match base, but such down,” points out political the Cauvery dispute get resolved with
between CSK and KKR. protests have observer S.J. Idhaya. “It the mere formation of the CMB? If and
While Stalin wanted to proved that fringe groups when the board is formed, there could be
make a political statement only brought a survive more on publicity a second round to the battle. Then things
on Cauvery, these fringe bad name to and cannot survive a police might shift to Karnataka, where its opp-
groups merely sought to Tamil Nadu. crackdown, unlike the case onents are lying in wait. O

18 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

 JUDICIAL FAITH

‘Impeachment of CJI
is nonsensical. Don’t
encourage the idea’.
Three months have gone by since the There is a move to impeach the CJI. There are no grounds to move an imp­
four senior-most judges of the Supreme Some Rajya Sabha MPs have already eachment motion at all. The move is
Court—next only to Chief Justice of signed the petition to bring the mot- absolutely ill­conceived. Even a mere
India Dipak Misra—made public their ion. Do you think there are grounds for proposal is enough to damage the pub­
grievances regarding the way he func- the CJI’s impeachment? lic perception of independence of Ind­
tioned. It was on January 12 that Justi- JITENDER GUPTA
ces Jasti Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi,
Madan Lokur and Kurian Joseph spoke
about the CJI assigning cases to selec-
tive preferred benches in his capacity as
the “master of the roster”. They par-
ticularly expressed displeasure about
the way in which the cases of Justice
B.H. Loya’s death and that of the Luc-
know-based Medical College admissions
scam, in which the CJI’s role itself has
come under a cloud, were allotted.
The crisis in judiciary has not abated
since. If anything, it has only escalated
with the Opposition MPs in the Rajya
Sabha collecting signatures to initiate
impeachment proceedings against the
CJI. The CJI, who is to retire on October
2 this year, is hearing some of the most
crucial cases before the apex court. These
include cases pertaining to Justice Loya’s
death, validity of Aadhaar and Ram Jan-
mabhoomi. Two of the judges, Justices
Chelameswar and Joseph, are unrelent-
ing in their public criticism of the judicial
system under the CJI. Interference of the
Executive in the appointment of judges to
the Supreme Court is another issue that is
rankling the puisne judges.
Bhavna Vij-Aurora spoke to former
Attorney General of India Soli Sorabjee
to put the entire imbroglio into perspec-
tive. The eminent jurist says that he is
“distressed” about the developments of
the past few weeks and hopes that all
differences will be settled in an amicable
manner for the sake of the credibility of
the country’s judicial system that its peo-
ple look up to.

20 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

 J U DI CIAL FAIT H
ian judiciary. You may not like
some verdict of a judge or of
the Chief Justice. Some order
or judgements may have been
unconventional but that is no
ground for impeachment.
In any case, there won’t be
requisite numbers for the imp­
eachment process to begin.
Therefore, the proposal is an
exercise in futility, but with a
great potential to damage the
institution. (The impeachm­
ent motion against the CJI
can either be initiated by 100
MPs in the Lok Sabha or 50
MPs in the Rajya Sabha.) Imp­
eachment is a serious matter. It can be
moved on grounds of “proved misbehav­
iour” that would mean corruption, brib­
ery, unbecoming conduct or gross mis­
carriage of justice. I am very distressed
about this entire talk of impeachment.
It is nonsensical and should not be given
encouragement.
The four senior-most judges came out
and addressed a press meet, pointing
fingers at the CJI. Was that the trigger
for the entire controversy?
That press conference should never have
happened. The judges should have tried
to resolve the matter internally.
The judges had claimed they were for-
ced to come out publicly, as their griev-
ances weren’t addressed internally…
That is no excuse. By going public, they
open the issue to politicians to jump into
the fray. They don’t realise that it shakes
the faith of the people in the judicial sys­
tem. The judges should have kept at it.
They should have consulted former chief
justices. They could have sought the help
of the Attorney General, other jurists. For
the people, judiciary is the last resort for
justice and their faith must remain int­
act. The faith of people in the institution
should not be diminished.
What do you think about CJI Misra
presiding over the case to decide the
powers of the Chief Justice, declaring
he has full powers to decide on alloca-
tion of cases and setting up benches?
Though he is right to claim that the CJI
is the first among equals and also to rei­
terate that he is the master of the roster,
he should not have heard the matter
himself. The CJI should have recused
himself from hearing the matter. He
should have let Justice Chelameswar to
hear the matter.
22 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
“
By going public, the
judges open the issue
to politicians to jump
into the fray. They don’t
realise that it shakes the
people’s confidence in
the judicial system.
The collegium system
may not be perfect. But it
is better than any others,
including the NJAC.
The Executive appointing
judges will only politicise
the whole legal set-up.
Justice Chelameswar refused to hear
Shanti Bhushan’s appeal questioning
unbridled powers to the CJI as the
master of roster…
It would be wise for Justice Chelameswar
to desist from public outbursts and
making statements. He is a learned and
knowledgeable judge. He should retire
in good grace. There is no need to resort
to petulance. (Justice Chelameswar is
due to retire on June 22, but that will
be the middle of Supreme Court vaca­
tion; so May 19 will effectively be his
last working day.)
What about the questions being raised
about the Executive’s interference in
the appointment of Supreme Court
judges? Justice Joseph has
written to the CJI, asking
him to act against govern-
mental interference as it is
affecting the independence
of judiciary.
The Executive cannot inter­
fere in the appointment and
elevation of judges. The Exec­
utive can give its input or inf­
ormation about the impend­
ing appointment but once the
collegium decides on the ele­
vation, it has to concede. The
government cannot sit on the
recommendations of the col­
PTI
legium like is the case now.
(The government has not cleared the
names of Uttarakhand High Court chief
justice K.M. Joseph and senior lawyer
Indu Malhotra for elevation as SC judges
despite the collegium’s recommenda­
tion three months ago.)
Your views on the collegium system?
The collegium system of appointments
of judges, like all human institutions,
may not be perfect. But it is much better
than any other system like the proposed
National Judicial Appointments Com­
mittee. The Executive appointing judges
will politicise the system; that will shake
people’s faith in the institution. The only
thing is that the members of the colle­
gium must act in the spirit of solidarity
and display leadership, and not the men­
tality of petty politicians. They have a
duty to resolve differences in an amica­
ble manner and not display bitterness if
somebody’s viewpoint is not accepted.
How do you think the current crisis
be resolved?
The Chief Justice needs to play a big role
in defusing the crisis. He should hold
consultations with the disgruntled jud­
ges and win over his colleagues. He must
display statesmanship and leadership.
Whatever apprehensions are there, the
CJI should try to assuage them. While he
is the master of roster, he must take care
to allocate matters as per the familiarity
of the judges regarding the issue at hand.
That’s what used to happen earlier. Tax
matters were allocated to judges who
understood such things. Criminal mat­
ters were given to judges who had some
expertise in the area. Broad parameters
should be defined for allocating cases.
The office of the CJI must not be weak­
ened. The institution of the judiciary
must not be weakened. O
 FAITH REJIG
by Ajay Sukumaran in Hubli

I
N a corner of the bustling street
leading to the Moorusavira Matha
in Hubli, the familiar rhythm of
rotis being pounded into shape
wafts up from a tiny shop next to a
Lingayat khanavali. It is not far
from where BJP president Amit Shah’s
election road show is passing by, with
saffron flags, drums and slogans. Here,
you get both the brittle and soft rotis
that are the vital underpinnings of the
meal served with sabzi, curd and she­
nga (groundnut) chutney in these
khanavalis or canteens across the wide
swathe of northern Karnataka where
the Lingayat community is spread out.
In sharp contrast to this common
menu, there’s an unfamiliar ingredi­
ent that’s been tossed into the election
spread in these parts.
Manjunath brings his dilemma into
perspective, while managing the store-
front with a toddler in tow while two
women in an inner room beat out the
rotis. From his customers, he hears both
sides of the debate. Some insist that if the
Lingayat faith gets recognised as a min-
ority religion, it would help with their
children’s education. Others argue that it
is wrong to break up the community into
Lingayats and Veerashaivas.
In the build-up to Basava Jayanthi this

week, the political waters have only got
muddier. Karnataka goes to polls on May
12, but there’s no clear indication how the
Lingayat voter will respond. It isn’t
merely tearing open the rift between
religious seers that is making it difficult.
Some are publicly endorsing the ruling
Congress that had recommended the
minority religion status, and stepping up
pressure on the BJP government at the
Centre. Earlier this month, BJP national
president Amit Shah’s comment that the
Centre would not act on the Karnataka
proposal brought nearly 40 Lingayat
seers together in Bangalore for a press
meet to make their stand clear. The min-
ority religion demand will be taken to its
logical conclusion, they said. In the mid-
dle of a poll, that’s a bit of a wild card.
“This (discussion) is only at an intellec-
tual level. For the common man, it’s a
non-issue,” insists BJP legislator Arvind
Bellad whose seat covers much of Dhar-
wad, Karnataka’s cultural capital upstate
that is home to writers and, equally,
Hindustani music. “Till five years ago, I
Vachana Versus
Theology and politics? Questions of self-definition roil Lin
did not know the difference and I’m a year, his writings arguing against creat-
Lingayat. My children don’t know what ing a wedge between Veerashaivas and
the issue is about.” It’s a fair enough obs- Lingayats were published by the Ram-
ervation you will commonly hear at bhapuri Matha, one of the five pancha
many places. But it’s also true that the peethas (religious centres) which are
Veerashaiva-Lingayat debate has been a now pitted against a large number
vocal one, getting prime time on televis- of Lingayat mathas.
ion debates and, further, by way of books The terms Veerashaiva and Lingayat,
and pamphlets often disseminated by the the Rambhapuri seer wrote in his preface
influential mathas. to the book, were as synonymous as
Then, you hear about activist groups in Bharat and India. “Actually, this has for
Belgaum, Bijapur and Bidar rallying to long been debated at a limited high level,
create public opinion. “It’s good that it among scholars,” says Dr Saundattimath.
has come out now. People will know what “Now, because of the elections, some
the facts are,” says Sangamesh Saunda- people think they are breaking our dha-
ttimath, 75, a professor of vachana litera- rma and that we should teach them a
ture who taught at the Karnataka lesson. So, there might be a bit of an
University in Dharwad. Over the past impact (in the polls),” he tells Outlook.

24 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018


Siddhalinga, Shivamurthy Murugha
“But if we abandon this
Vachana
GETTY IMAGES
gayat country ahead of polls.
It’s a complicated issue for many rea-
sons. At one level, it appears as an asser-
tion by a large section of Lingayat mathas
that run hundreds of schools and colleges
across Karnataka which would benefit
from the minority religion recognition.
It’s also a protest against the pancha
peethas that have traditionally claimed
an upper hand in the community though
they are fewer in number. The main
grouse against them is that they do not
recognise Basavanna as the founder of
the Lingayat religion but instead claim
that Veerashaivas existed before the
12th-century social reformer. Alongside
this, differences crop up between the two
groups of religious gurus—both in terms
of worship and protocol.
SEERS’ MEET Jayamrithunjaya, feel there will be good impact, some say
there will be no impact. But if there was
anger or wrath, we would have already
So even when seers gather, some point experienced it by now.”
out, the pancha peetha swamijis are In any Karnataka election, the Lingayat
seated in an elevated position compared factor matters. It’s something the
to others. This and some of their rituals Congress learnt at great cost in the early
highlight the social rigidity that Basava- 1990s when it alienated itself from the
nna rebelled against, claim the Lingayat community by the offhand sacking of
seers. “They were rajgurus, so they were Veerendra Patil as CM. The Congress has
given a throne and crown. The kings went never been able to reclaim its support
but the tradition continued. That’s all,” which went to the Janata Dal. When the
counters Dr Saundattimath. Now, as a Dal split, the votes got eventually trans-
fallout of this conflict, several religious ferred to the BJP. Since 2008, when the
gurus have supported a new association, Lingayats firmly backed B.S. Yediyurappa,
Jagathika Lingayat Mahasabha, which again over a perceived unfair treatment
rivals the All India Veerashaiva Maha- to him, the community’s vote has been
sabha that used to be the main represent- fairly predictable.
ative body of the community and is The Lingayats are generally believed to
mostly led by political leaders. constitute 17 per cent of Karnataka’s elec-
Tontadarya matha seer Siddalinga torate. Ever since the minority religion
Swami says they have no problem controversy began, experts have further
whoever comes to power. dissected that chunk to
peg the Veerashaiva pop-
movement now, we may ulation at around three
not get such an opportu- “If we abandon per cent of the community.
nity again in our lifetimes,” this movement “Now, if you assume that the
he told a recent press now, we may Congress has no vote base
conference in Bangalore. not get such in the entire community,
The Tontadarya matha is whatever votes come their
located in Gadag, an hour’s an opportunity way will be a gain,” says one
drive from Dharwad, again,” says observer. Many BJP lead-
where both groups held a matha seer. ers too, he says, were wary
huge rallies over the past of this issue cropping up
few months. “Why the before elections because it
Lingayat movement is a big headache knew it was a potential spoiler. “There
for Amit Shah is because we are saying will definitely be an impact in north
that Lingayats are not Hindus,” he says, Karnataka and ‘Hyderabad-Karnataka’,”
as the activists in the audience periodi- he says. Apart from Dalits and Muslims,
cally broke into slogans such as Bharata this region also comprises a significant
desha, Jai Basavesha. Indeed, many of population of Kurubas, the community
those who protest any attempt to break to which Siddaramaiah belongs.
the community into Veerashaivas and A decade ago, the sympathy wave for
Lingayats will still concede that the Yediyurappa, combined with the might of
Lingayat faith propagated by Basavanna the Reddy brothers, mining magnates
is an independent religion. from Bellary, helped the BJP sweep
While the BJP is treading carefully on elections across the Lingayat heartland.
this issue, Shah has been visiting several Then, in 2013, the party’s voteshare
important mathas across the state. It’s a splintered with a split in the party. This
common poll-time practice for politicians time, the party is back in one piece but
because of the regard local people have then comes along the Lingayat issue.
for the seers, but it has become especially Of course, there are other dynamics
relevant given the current mood. “What that come into play. The Veerashaiva-
the BJP did, when we saw Siddaramaiah’s Lingayats have innumerable sub-castes;
move to cut into Lingayat-Veerashaiva so competing candidates are often from
was to just wait for people to realise what the same caste. Besides, the mood also
was going on,” says Bellad. “So, in the appears to differ. Says a Lingayat farmer
process (chief minister) Siddaramaiah from Yelburga in Koppal district: “This is
and his way of doing politics got exposed.” an issue only for you folks in Bangalore
Counters a senior Congress leader: “Some and on television, possibly. I’m not both-
30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 25
 FA I T H REJIG
ered about all this. Elections or not,
we’ve got to toil anyway.”
There’s an afternoon drizzle in
Sirigere village and along the main
road leading to the serene environs of
the Taralabalu matha from where a
breeze carries the chorus of school-
children reciting vachanas. The matha,
off the highway connecting Davana-
gere and Chitradurga in central Kar-
nataka, is the seat of Shivamurthy
Shivacharya Mahaswamiji, one of the
few Lingayat pontiffs who has kept
away from public pronouncements on
the issue. He’s a Sanskrit scholar who
also wrote a computer programme to
analyse Sanskrit grammar.
I
NSIDE the matha, the junior seer
Panditaradhya Shivacharya Swami
spells out their view. “Let the gov-
ernment give minority status or not.
It doesn’t affect us. We believe the
Lingayat faith is an independent one,”
he says. The monastery, he says, runs
260 institutions with 40,000 students
across the state but isn’t attracted by
the benefits that the minority status
will bring. “If they come, it’s welcome.
But we will not ask anyone to recog-
nise our faith as a minority religion
just for that,” he tells Outlook. The
issue, he says, isn’t likely to affect the
polls in these parts.
The Davanagere region has a
significant Veerashaiva population
unlike the districts to the north of the
Tungabhadra where the Lingayats
dominate. And, as the locals point out,
it’s about the only place where there
haven’t been rallies over the issue.
But, at the same time, the Murugha
matha pontiff from neighbouring
Chitradurga put things plainly
enough at the seers’ press conference
last week. “Sahakarakke sahakara
(mutual cooperation)” was the phrase
he used even while he told reporters
that “there must be distance between
religion and politics”. The agitation,
he warned, will continue until the
community gets minority status.
The election heat is only just start-
ing to pick up in Karnataka, now that
all the parties have finalised candi-
dates. Will the Lingayat issue reso-
nate loudly enough to swing the polls?
And, if it does, which way will it swing?
Ask most politicians and you’ll get a
stock reply: answers on May 15. O
26 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
Mystic Accountant
Academic and author Sunil Khilnani’s
bestselling 2016 book Incarnations: India
in 50 Lives, had short, fascinating profiles
of people who made India. One of the
chapters, A Voice In The Air, was on the
poet and philosopher Basava. An excerpt.
BASAVA’S early life, as told in legend, is a
characteristically Indian story of a
spiritual search. Like the Buddha or
Mahavira, the hero renounces his high
birth, leaves home and wanders, before
finding enlightenment. He was born in
the early 1100s, in today’s Karnataka.
We’re told that his parents, high-caste
Brahmins, died young. He was raised by
his extended family and trained in the
Sanskrit tradition, but something pushed
him to question their orthodox beliefs. He
left home around the age of sixteen with
an emphatic gesture. According to at least
one version of the story, he didn’t just cut
ties with his family; he literally cut the
sacred thread Brahmins wear to repre-
sent their ‘twice-born’ status.
At Kudalasangama, one of the great riv-
ers of the south, the Krishna, receives a
smaller tributary, the Malaprabha....
Basava spent several years here in
spiritual retreat. ‘Lord of the meeting
rivers’: the phrase became a regular ref-
rain in his verses because it was
at this river juncture, or sangam,
that he discovered his personal
god. But Basava’s spiritualism
had a worldly edge. He eventu-
ally moved to the city of Kalyana
and became, of all things, an
accountant. Marrying
strategically, he rose to the rank
of chief treasurer to the local
king. But as with Wallace Stevens, insur-
ance executive, or T. S. Eliot, bank clerk,
or Philip Larkin, librarian, the day job
belied the fullness of the life.
* * *
THE flow of the Krishna river has now
been altered by the Almatti dam, com-
pleted in 2005, which submerged many of
the fields around Kudalasangama. But the
engineers managed to save Basava’s
samadhi, his last resting place—and even
give it an added mystery. At the bottom of
a deep spiral stairwell, about forty metres
below the sangam, is a canopied memo-
AJAY SUKUMARAN
TALL ICON A statue of Basaveshwara
at Gadag city in north Karnataka
rial, where people come to pray and make
offerings to Basava. Today, the memory of
Basava and his teachings is maintained by
a substantial religious community called
the Lingayats. To what might have been
Basava’s consternation, they function as a
caste group, with their own internal hier-
archy.... The name Lingayat comes from
the lingam—in this case, a small polished
stone or phallic object symboliz-
ing Shiva—which members of
the community wear in a pouch
around their necks. Though a
religious minority, they are a
force in Karnataka’s electoral
politics. Near the end of Basava’s
life, his radicalism proved his
personal undoing. In challeng-
ing the social and political order,
he took a step too far and sanctioned an
inter-caste marriage. The marriage was to
join two children from his community of
followers: a boy, born an outcaste, and a
girl, born a Brahmin. The orders from his
offended king were brutal. Members of
the wedding party had their eyes gouged
out. Their bodies were trampled by ele-
phants in the streets. Rioting ensued, as
Basava’s outraged followers ignored their
guru’s pleas not to turn violent. Before
long, the king was murdered, the Vira-
shaiva community was scattered, and a
broken Basava fled the city. His death
came shortly after. O
 DEBT MOUNDS

Default Sinkholes
The regulatory tool seeking to minimise damage from the menace of mounting
NPAs was given new teeth, but it will be a long and hard road to recovery
By Lola Nayar issues. The IBC rules mandate that a bad The recent claim of the ruling BJP, that

T
loan resolution plan must be agreed they have already recovered Rs 4 lakh
HE Insolvency and Bankruptcy upon within 270 days, failing which liq­ crore from defaulting companies with
Code, or IBC, is in the news uidation of the company’s assets is the implementation of the IBC, sounds
again. This time, some are won- mandated. The remaining 25 companies premature. The RBI data shows that
dering whether the code is referred by the RBI to the NCLT are part public sector banks recovered only
being diluted to soften the blow of the second tranche (referred to as the Rs 15,786 crore in 2016­17 fiscal and in
of NPA (non-performing assets) NCLT­II list), with a total bad debt of 2017­18 till December 31, through all
resolutions on defaulting companies. around Rs. 1.3 lakh crore. recovery channels, including the IBC,
Over 4,700 cases have been referred
to the National Company Law Tribu-
nal (NCLT): these include cases under
BIFR (Board of Industrial and Finan-
cial Reconstruction) and in various
high courts. The prime tool in this
marathon exercise—to get back lakhs
of crores of bank funds stuck in debt-
laden companies through asset sale—
is the IBC 2016, which was amended
last year to debar promoters of the
defaulting companies from re-acquir-
ing the distressed assets. As with all
efforts to get corporates to repay their
bad debts, IBC implementation too is
not without its share of pulls and
pressures. It raises the question of
whether the industry is out to stall the
process of auction or liquidation of
bankrupt companies.
“I don’t see it (as stalling the process)
that way,” says Rakesh Bharti Mittal,
president, Confederation of Indian
Industry (CII). “With any major reform
or policy initiative brought in by the
government, there are going to be imp­
lementation issues. There would be
factors that may not have been envis­
aged when the policy was put in place, be
it in the case of GST or the IBC. What we
need to see is if it is good for the country.
And the answer is a resounding yes as
otherwise, we are looking at job losses
and money going down the drain.”
Among the cases referred to the NCLT
are 37 selected by the Reserve Bank of
India. These include 12 cases in which
the defaulters owe banks around Rs 2.78
lakh crore, with deadlines for liquida­
tion falling within a month. But it seems
unlikely that this deadline will be met
given the innumerable unresolved

28 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

out of over Rs 8.4 lakh crore estimated
NPAs. On the other hand, in 21 months,
till December end last year, loan
amounting to Rs 1,65,955 crore had been
written off, according to RBI data.
It may take some time to smoothen the
wrinkles in the IBC. “It’s utopian to exp­
ect that all loopholes will instantly dis­
appear as a result of the suggested
improvements,” says Raj Khosla, MD of
financial services marketpkace Mymon­
eymantra. “IBC implementation will
continue to evolve for the next few
months. But the process will, no doubt,
expedite recoveries.”
Legal experts say that the resolution
plans submitted in some of the compa­
nies identified by the RBI for proceeding
under the IBC will help banks have a size, range of businesses and tasks. The
resolution with regards to their SMEs are quite different from these very
long­pending debts. “Whenever a new large companies, as they would have
law is enacted, it usually gets litigated simpler, ‘vanilla’ borrowings. The larger
till its equilibrium is achieved,” says companies will have international oper­
Krishnamurthy Subramanian, associate ations, may have foreign currency bor­
professor of finance, Indian School of rowing or have a derivative contract.
Business. “The biggest problem in India “The IBC covers the entire gamut of
is that big unscrupulous promoters pay scenarios. Earlier, under the BIFR, it
their way through the whole process. was restricted only to the manufactur­
This is precisely the case with wilful ing sector, which was easier to under­
defaulters. It’s very hard to legislate stand and predict. But when you come to
against unscrupulousness. Enacting a the services sector, like real estate, with
law is then like trying to fix four holes the Supreme Court saying that the
and seeing the unscrupulous promoters homebuyers interest must be protected,
opening a fifth hole. Consequently, we add to which the fact that contracting
are moving from one case to another and companies have other complications,
every case brings up a new feature.” it’s a gamut of problems that couldn’t
The process of bad loan resolution, have been expected from day one. To get
particularly in the case of steel and to the highway you have to pass through
cement companies referred to the other sections of the road, but surely,
NCLT, bears out that the task ahead is you are getting there,” says Bahuguna..
not going to be easy. The stakeholders in Notwithstanding the hiccups along the
the defaulting companies, the lenders way, Bahuguna is confident that each
and the bidders will face improvement will be
many challenges in the better in terms of clar­
race to acquire distressed “The IBC ity. Subramanian agrees
assets. In some cases, a amendment that IBC is a step in the
lack of bidders is putting process could right direction but he
a question mark on how
much the banks will
have been more points out that it is obvi­
ously not a panacea as it
forego in the process of consultative, cannot substitute for
resolution. keeping the banks not carrying out
Many experts feel the door open for their businesses prop­
banking crisis could have other views.” erly. “That said, it is
been avoided to some better to have an IBC
extent if a bankruptcy that evolves than no
legislation had been in place prior to mechanism at all,” he adds. “Compared
2016. The IBC is expected to bring in a to the no IBC scenario, the borrowers
sense of urgency to fix the problems now definitely have a reason to be scared
within a finite period. about the fate of their business. Earlier,
But why is it being tweaking only now? they could default with impunity. Now,
Some say the IBC is still a work in pro­ even an operational creditor can take
gress and it will take some years before them to bankruptcy, which creates a
it fully evolves. “The tweaking was to be threat for sure. Going forward, some of
expected as the law makers couldn’t the current legacy loans will see a lot of
have possibly foreseen all the problems. jostling as the bankrupt companies try
Public opinion made the government to push the boundaries of the legal sys­
realise that defaulting promoters should tem to extract as much as possible.
not be allowed to participate in the bid­ However, further into the future, the
ding process (for auction of distressed IBC will be very useful.”
assets),” says Vinayak Bahuguna, MD, The developments so far have thrown
CEO, Asset Reconstruction Company. up several crucial issues and some sur­
He is of the view that the “process could prises, like offers to pay full dues as in the
have been more consultative, keeping case of Uttam Galva Steels. So, there is
the door open for views of opinion­mak­ scope for improvement. Further tweak­
ers and public debates before deciding ing of the IBC is surely on the cards. Its
on the best course of action.” main test will be how much of the dis­
Bahuguna says the IBC covers compa­ tressed assets are banks able to recover,
nies that are too complex in terms of and more importantly, how soon. O
Illustration by SAJITH KUMAR 30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 29
 GALLERY OF SHAME Prime accused Sanji Ram (right) and the
other accused in the Kathua rape and murder case

COV E R STO RY

RAPTORS OF HATRED
An eight-year-old girl’s gory end took J&K’s ruling coalition to the brink and back

by Naseer Ganai in Srinagar

D
EEPIKA Singh Rajawat, a 38-year-old Jammu-based lawyer,
says she has been threatened with sexual assault for taking
up the case of the brutal rape and murder of eight-year-old
Asifa from the nomadic Bakarwal community in Jammu and
Kashmir’s Kathua district. “I am being hated. I have been
isolated. I don’t know whether I will survive this,” says Raja-
wat, who had filed a writ petition in the J&K High Court in Febru-
ary, seeking a court-monitored investigation on behalf of Asifa’s
father. She says it was only after the court began monitoring the
case that investigation showed results.
“This hatred has to do with the politico-religious nexus—the use of
religion to mobilise partisan support, which has been a feature of poli-
tics in South Asia for almost a hundred years now,” says Siddiq Wahid,
former vice-chancellor of Islamic University of Science and Technology
in Pulwama district. “And this also has to do with the blurring of lines
 COVER STORY

between democratic empowerment and parti-

san emboldening in politics. Democratic emp-
owerment makes good argumentation the
central feature of the process. Partisan embold-
ening allows for partisans to claim preferential
treatment as a right for reasons of identity. The
BJP-RSS family has concentrated on embold-
ening India’s majority to become majoritarian
aggressively and without apology. That’s
Hindutva. Hate is just a step away.”
The Asifa case brought the BJP-PDP ruling
alliance to the brink, and it took the forced
resignation of forest minister Choudhary Lal
Singh and industries minister Chander Prakash
Ganga, both from the BJP, to save the day for the
coalition government. This did not, however,
quell the increasingly shrill demand among
sections of the Hindu population in Jammu for
the probe in Asifa’s case to be handed over to the
CBI, highlighting their lack of trust in institu-
tions functioning under the state government. AP
The two ministers who resigned had attended NEXT IN LINE? Rohingya refugees at a camp on the outskirts of Jammu
the Hindu Ekta Manch rally on March 1 to pro-
test against the arrests in the Asifa case. On April 14, soon after community to flee the area. Community leaders apprehend
the BJP’s general secretary in charge of J&K, Ram Madhav, that right-wing elements could next use the tribal policy of the
announced the ministers had stepped down, CM Mehbooba government to evict the Bakarwals as “encroachers” on forest
Mufti sent out a message through the party’s spokesman land. In February, the CM had chaired a meeting of the state
Naeem Akhtar, affirming the alliance is safe and that, if the tribal affairs ministry and said no member of the Bakarwal
BJP continues to support victims even in cases other than community should be evicted until a formal tribal policy is in
Asifa’s, the alliance is here to stay. Akhtar also said the place—and that if eviction is “absolutely necessary”, then it
“pro-rapist bandh” of the Jammu High Court Bar Association must be done only with the ministry’s prior approval. The
(JHCBA) on April 11 had a Congress imprint—the Bar presi- Jammu Bar opposed this directive of the CM, triggering appre-
dent B.S. Salathia was the chief electoral agent of Congress hension among the Bakarwals.
leader Ghulam Nabi Azad in the 2014 general elections. As the Crime Branch probe reveals, Asifa was held captive,
drugged, beaten up and repeatedly raped from January 10 to 15,

A
senior PDP leader says his party had conveyed to the BJP inside a Hindu place of worship. The sheer brutality triggered
top brass that it would be difficult to save the coalition if rage against Lal Singh and Ganga for addressing the March 1
Lal Singh and Ganga remained ministers. Another PDP rally. Ganga had told the gathering that the Crime Branch had
leader says state intelligence agencies had also conveyed created a “jungle raj” in the area, while Lal Singh had said, “One
to the Centre that if no action was taken against the accused in girl has been killed here now, but they don’t realise many women
Asifa’s case and those who rallied in their defence, “the inse- have gone missing,” indirectly referring to the 1947 riots.
cure Gujjars, facing eviction from the forests, would get closer Earlier, on May 18, 2016, Lal Singh had threatened the
to Kashmiri separatists”. (Gujjar tribals in J&K are a large, Bakarwal delegation when they petitioned him to allow graz-
varied set, differentiated by whether they are fully or semi-set- ing rights on the forest land. “Have you forgotten 1947?” the
tled or pastoral nomadic, like the Bakarwals; the terms are then minister is alleged to have said, alluding to the massacre
often used interchangeably or together.) In fact, former army of Muslims in Jammu during Partition. After his resignation,
chief and MoS (External Affairs) V.K. Singh became the first Lal Singh says he supports three demands of the JHCBA:
prominent BJP leader to come out against the rapists when he transfer the rape and murder case to the CBI, rescind the
tweeted, “We have failed Asifa as humans.” As the army sees minutes of the February meeting of the tribal affairs ministry,
the Bakarwals as a second line of defence from militancy, the and remove the Rohingya refugees from Jammu.
Centre grasped the larger fallout of defending the BJP minis- The JHCBA has been seen as a force to reckon with in
ters, and also its potential impact in the rest of the country after Jammu since the 1980s. In 1984, when the then CM Dr Farooq
the chargesheet was presented in court despite obstruction by Abdullah wanted to do away with the practice of the ‘darbar
the Kathua lawyers. After resigning, however, both Lal Singh move’ (shifting the secretariat to Jammu for six months from
and Ganga laid the blame at the BJP’s door, saying it was their November to April every year), the Bar opposed it. “The Bar
state party president, Sat Sharma, who had sent them to attend called off the strike only after the then Union home minister
the March 1 rally. Both raised questions over the inquiry by the Buta Singh negotiated with them and Farooq was compelled
J&K Police’s Crime Branch and called for a CBI probe instead. to give up on his plan.” Again, in 2008, the Bar was part of the
According to the Crime Branch chargesheet, the Bakarwal Amarnath Yatra Sangharsh Samiti agitation during which an
girl’s rape was plotted for months to send out a message to her economic blockade was imposed on the Valley. Bar leaders

34 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

 ries are now between a highway and a railway
track, they have become more valuable and
hence the community is being projected as one
of encroachers, say Bakarwal leaders. On
February 22, 2016, another Gujjar basti was
razed to the ground allegedly by RSS men and
the police. “The SHO involved in the crime, I
have heard, has got a medal,” claims Talib, who
believes the sustained attempts to force them
to leave the region began with the formation of
the BJP-PDP alliance.
More than two lakh lakh tribals use the foothills
from Kathua to Jammu as winter pastures. The
government has started a mega project of fencing
all pastures in the name of forest protection, but
the tribal leaders think the objective is to drive
out their communities. With PM Narendra Modi
condemning the rape of Asifa and the PDP and
BJP agreeing on the need to ensure justice in this
case, there is fear of more conflict in Jammu over
Rising Kashmir tribal rights now. “A panel of ministers under
PREJUDICED PRIDE Hindu Ekta Manch rally in defence of rape accused deputy CM Nirmal Singh is looking into tribal
policy,” says tribal affairs minister Choudhary
take pride in recalling that they didn’t allow Farooq and Zulfikar. “It will decide whether the government will approve
Mehbooba Mufti to step out of Jammu airport for three hours. the welfare policy in vogue across the country for the whole state
The Bar has been supporting the demands of the Hindu Ekta or not. It is not a matter of some Jammu districts alone.”
Manch since its formation this February, with RSS activist and Srinagar-based columnist and writer Riyaz Wani says, “The
BJP worker Vijay Sharma at the helm, immediately after the rise of communalism in Jammu goes back to the Partition
arrest of one of the main accused in the Asifa case, Special Police riots of 1947. Moreover, from being the ruling class, the
Officer Deepak Khajuria. On February 14, the Manch took out a Jammu Dogras had to come to terms with their minority sta-
rally with protesters waving the tricolour. tus in the state. Jammu has also been host to a number of
The CM has been in the Bar’s crosshairs since the beginning. refugees since 1947—those from Muzaffarabad (in PoK), the
On March 8, the Bar accused her of “facilitating a biased probe” West Pakistan refugees and the Kashmiri Pandit migrants in
to “humiliate, torture and demoralise” the Hindus of Jammu. the 1990s. All these have consequences.”
Now the attention is being shifted to the Rohingya refugees. As According to Wani, the Congress has always played the
early as February, the Manch had alleged that the entire Jammu communal card in Jammu opportunistically, but since 2014
region, including Kathua and Hiranagar, is witnessing a “demo- the BJP is doing it openly, leading to the situation where the
graphic invasion that would help the cause of jehad”. However, Hindu Ekta Manch could be formed to protest against the
Jammu-based political analyst Zafar Choudhary says almost arrest of the rape accused. The insurgency in Kashmir has also
half of the 5,000 Rohingyas in Jammu have been moved out. had an impact on the Muslim regions of Jammu—the Chenab
Bakarwal leader Talib Hussain, who was arrested in January Valley and Pir Panjal—and the migration of Muslims and
for protesting Asifa’s rape and then released under public pres- Hindus from these regions to Jammu and Kathua districts
sure, says a sense of demographic insecurity has been created in brought along different narratives in its wake.
the majority community by right-wing elements. According to Jammu-based political analyst Tarun Upadhyay says there
the chargesheet, main accused Sanji Ram planned to dislodge is a feeling in Jammu that the demand for a CBI probe was
the Bakarwals from Rasana village and hatched a conspiracy unfortunately being seen as being pro-rapist and communal.
resulting in the “gruesome rape and murder of an “Jammu is the meeting point of several cul-
innocent, budding flower”. He had been mobilis- tures and religions. We have been host to all
ing members of his community to refuse grazing faiths and cultures since 1947. You cannot
land or any other assistance to the Bakarwals. State agencies had accuse us of being communal,” he says.
Talib tells Outlook that Lal Singh and Ganga
were at the root of the problem. Ganga allegedly
told the Centre that A senior government official, however, says
“this is the lull before a storm...I fear anything
pasted posters in his constituency during the Bakarwals are likely to can happen in Jammu”. CM Mehbooba Mufti
2014 polls, calling for the removal of Bakarwals realises it. Perhaps, that is why she went out of
from Samba district. “A Gujjar basti at Vijaypur get closer to Kashmiri the way to praise Jammu for “showing unwa-
was attacked during his victory rally,” says Talib. vering support for a little girl”. “It has strengt-
During a cabinet meeting in 2015, Ganga opposed
separatists if no action hened my belief that Jammu serves as a model
the posting of a Muslim superintendent of police
in Samba, saying, “I don’t need a Muslim SP.”
is taken in the Asifa of inclusiveness, and that the people of Jammu
and the people of Kashmir together inspire
As the lands used by the Bakarwals for centu- case, says a PDP leader. secular unity and righteousness,” she says. O

30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 35

 COVER STORY OPI NI ON
THE THESAUR
SHIV In the brutalities that the Bakarwal child suffered till she died,
VISVANATHAN
T
HE psychologist, Bruno Bettleheim, who
was a concentration camp survivor, once
wrote of a psychologist who went to inter­
view Adolf Eichmann. The scholar found
his own questions inadequate, unable to
meet and match the mundanity of the man
in front of him and the enormity of his crime.
The psychologist claimed he felt less normal than
Eichmann after interviewing him. Innocuous,
trite, replete with cliches, Eichmann demanded
a different level of analysis. He behaved as if his
hate had been sanitised into a management mac­
hine and violence transformed into a question of
productivity and technique. Eichmann’s hate and
violence represents the rationalisation of violence
that has become impersonalised and techno­
cratic. The violence we are discussing today is less
sanitised, individualised, still brutal, embodying a
pin cushion of frightening emotions. The chron­
icle of Kathua demands a different narrative to
comprehend the folklore of hate underlying it.
One senses Bettleheim’s consternation and per­
plexity in the writings of journalists covering
events such as riots, lynch mobs or gang­rapes in
India. There is indignation, shock and profession­
alism in the detailing of events and excesses, yet
despite some stark reporting of brutality, the story
of hatred is inconclusive and incomplete.
Hatred, as a social scientist told me, demands to
be a thrice­told narrative. Firstly, one needs an
ethnography of detail, which has to go beyond the
mimicry of a self­styled Guinness Book of Excess.
Secondly, one needs a theory providing insights
and even requiring a sense of new possibilities. Yet
theory cannot restrict itself to the bureaucratic
and the political. One has to return to the moral
foundations of the society and confront hatred
with the nomos, the axiomatic requirements of a
good society. The task is difficult because hatred
has a mundanity and an epic character to it, an
anecdotal feel and yet an enormity of intensity and
scale, which makes it incomprehensible. How does
one describe hate? One needs to be both a philos­
opher and botanist of emotions, reading hate like
a special species of inhumanity.
Recently, I was reading Martin Buber’s great
classic about the wonders of a face­to­face rela­
36 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
tionship, where the great philosopher develops the
contrast between the reverence, the aesthetics of
the I­Thou relationship and the indifference of the
I­It relationship. Hate is that no man’s land and
every man’s land between the borders of reverence
and the boundaries of indifference. Even Buber,
for all his eloquence, was not able to comprehend
the distance between Jew and Arab, caught in the
ethnocentricity of valorising a settler’s mentality
over a nomadic community.
Hatred is one emotion where the self cannot do
without the other. It is almost as if an exaggerated
ontology, a being of the other, is needed to con­
struct the self, no matter how impoverished. One
has to deconstruct it like a detective novel, con­
necting attitudes, motivation and the acts of vio­
lence, where Kathua is text, pretext and context
for an analysis of hate.
Kathua shows that hate always needs a penum­
bra of other emotions—of contempt, suspicion,
misunderstanding and hyperbolic insecurity—to
thrive. In that sense, for all its single­minded focus,
hate is a many­layered emotion, needing a thesau­
rus of feelings to articulate it. It has an alchemy of
its own, an attitude embodying violence embodied
in stereotypes (ethnic), ideologies (class enemies)
and institutional rituals like lynching or jehad. It is
an attitude to a stranger, the unwelcome other—a
response to a real or imagined threat that can be a
mere construct. For example, in Rwanda, the dif­
ference between Hutu and Tutsi was marginal, but
minor differences were exaggerated by a hyper­
bolic memory, which triggered genocidal violence,
eliminating almost a million people. It confirmed
the Shakespearean dictum in Macbeth—“the
To describe nearer in blood, the nearer bloody.”
hate, one Hate is both belief and ritual, a framework of
categories for distancing and stigmatising the
also needs other, and “rituals” that channelise violence,
to be a stoking hatred like a perpetual fire. Yet for all its
botanist of exaggerated power, there is a banalisation of cate­
emotions, gories needed to sustain the everydayness of vio­
reading hate lence—the everyday emotions of suspicion,
distrust, envy, without which hate is powerless.
like a special The language at a social level is mundane, regard­
species of less of the personal intensity of individual emo­
inhumanity. tions. Secondly, the emotions can be ersatz. For
US OF UNLOVING
we need to see the battle of hate against the moral emptiness of democracy

example, studies of Partition chronicle a strange

difference between the feelings of original vic­
tims and the attitudes of the second generation.
First­generation victims are more complex.
They feel injustice, regret and loss, and a lost love
for a home. When a visitor came from Karachi,
the original survivor would rush to enquire about
his home or his favourite sweet shop. It is the
second generation, which consumes Partition
without experiencing it, that feels hate in an
abstract, ideological and genocidal sense. In fact,
it is this category that supplies the willing perpe­
trators of the RSS, the BJP and the VHP—the real
practitioners of sustained hate.

I
N the case of Kathua, one sees an articulation
of border fears, an exaggerated fear spread by
BJP propaganda about the fertile Muslim des­
troying the demographic balance today. It is
the Hindu fear of Malthusianism directed against
the Muslim, who is also nomadic, pastoral and
not quite fitting the civics of development, creat­
ing a double alienation, where the other is both
alien and unfit to be a neighbour. What looks like
a powerful labyrinth of stereotypes becomes a
ALAMY
magnet for the vilest emotions, like lust, rape,
torture—a distance from the other that feels no
guilt, that eliminates all responsibility and, in
fact, becomes an example of a machismo of vio­
lence that seeks to displace or eliminate the
other, in this case, Bakarwal pastoralists who are
also non­sedentary and Muslims.
In a double sense, hate both depersonalises and
demonises. Yet it is the economy of hate that is
critical. Hate always needs redundancy and exc­
ess. It is a need that is perpetually unsatiated,
where a notion of limit is an unacceptable taboo.
It is both surprising in the new brutality it inv­
ents, and yet a sense of stereotype and herd int­
ensity makes the perpetrators appear more like
Pavlovian dogs, salivating predictably and glee­
fully at every signal. By stigmatising the other as
victim, the perpetrator has already exonerated
himself from guilt and doubt, combining a sense
of being both agency and vehicle, visualising
indiscriminate violence as a pedagogic act, where
the other has to be brought in line with the
Photographs: ALAMY

30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 37

 COVER STORY OPI NI ON
imagined self. A woman has to be disciplined for
her dress, a Dalit warned about imitating dominant
castes, and an ethnic group taught to recognise
itself as a lesser order of being. The pomposity and
righteousness that follow acts of hate violence
almost assure the perpetrator that society sees
him as a hero, a warrior for a cause. Lawyers tried
to block the filing of charges. The mob in Jaipur
raised hosannas to Afrazul’s murderers, which
made them sound as if they were honouring a hero.
When society, politics and bureaucracy connive
in such an act, we induce a death of conscience
sandwiched between alienation and anomie
(normlessness). These murders won’t produce
Shakespearean soliloquies of doubt or the need for
redemption, but just messages of self­congratula­
tion. Every official governmental response prom­
ises a return to law and order, but rarely a moral
order. Governments, whether Modi or Mufti,
appear like a Rip van Winkle uttering clichés bef­
ore returning to a clerical passivity. When Modi
speaks, there seems to be no difference between
the language of moral order and a promise of
higher productivity. The rhetoric of development
and the violence of the current state become more
a paradigm for sanitising or ideologising hate than
a search for the moral order of a good society.
T
HERE are moments of distraction or diver­
sion in the narrative that we must be wary of.
The brutalisation of Asifa occurred in a
temple and often before engaging in the
sheer redundancy of rape, the perpetrators
would engage in rituals placating some god. It
was as if a modicum of prayer added to the legit­
imacy of rape. Not all these acts should be con­
fused with occult rituals because occult was an
attempt to challenge the secular consciousness
with a rereading of the relation between magic,
science and religion. Such superstition as in
Kathua is almost promoted to a tantric legiti­
macy. Yet the very idea of such possibilities opens
one out to the relation between hate and evil,
because occult as a pre­Freudian consciousness
captured this canvas of evil, as hate gets ritual­
ised. Language thus becomes a critical form of
understanding hatred, but language too can be
deceptive. Hate can be a flat land of distances or
a valley of specific differences. One has to learn
to decode it. I am reminded of a story that I read
in an essay by the psychologist Carl Jung.
Jung recounts a visit by the great Irish writer,
the wonderfully inventive James Joyce. The aut­
hor of Ulysses brought his son along and talked
excitedly about latter’s command of language.
Jung listened patiently and then told Joyce that
while his writing revealed the power of language
and its perpetual inventiveness, his son’s vocabu­
38 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
GETTY IMAGES
HOLOCAUST Adolf lary was symptomatic of schizophrenia. Kathua
Eichmann (above); captures this schizophrenia of hatred. Hate, for all
Jews being rounded its demonic power, lacks convincing poetics. All it
up by the Nazi SS in can contain is the corrosive power of violence and
Warsaw, Poland, 1943 stereotype. In fact, as one replays the conversa­
tions of the perpetrators or even the language of
lawyers hysterical about defending them, all one
sees is a mediocrity, a overblown pettiness, where
vice as a habit is ordained as virtue. One wishes
media reports were more fine­tuned to the medi­
ocrity of language in hate, without confusing it
with the intensity of animosity and hatred.
Yet when we think of an alternative, we must
realise that tolerance and secularism as antidotes
will not do. Tolerance is too passive and secular­
ism almost empty today. One needs a pluralism
that is dialogic and a language that can challenge
the stereotypes of the procrustean frames of
modern state, racism, ideology and nationalism,
many of them 19th­century consolidations that
need 21st­century exorcism.
The analyst needs to heal his own professional­
ism before he steps in. In fact, one has to add that
politics and bureaucracy add little in terms of
moral responsibility, though they might add to a
regulatory frame. One needs to create a Dur­
kheimian frame, where hate is read as a social
fact permeating the individual, as a symbolic
order of reality that imprisons the other in per­
petual otherness. One needs a holism that goes
beyond itemisation or a symptomology. One
needs the moral risks of a dialogue that dissolves
One needs borders and distances to capture the truth of
the moral difference, separating genuine doubts and fears
from an epidemic of virulence.
risks of a
Democracy is still a long way from inventing
dialogue that these experiments. Maybe it’s not social science or
dissolves clinical psychology that we need, but a rethinking
borders and of moral and ethical foundations. What we are
distances confronting is the battle of hate against democra­
cy’s moral emptiness. One has to find wisdom not
to capture in social science, but in folklore, the cosmology of
the truth of people, and search for a thorough­minded resolu­
difference. tion, which has to be reworked repeatedly. O
 I N T ERVIEW

‘Not sick, we’re

visited Muslim neighbours in support;
actors, professionals, spoke out. I don’t
see us collectively expressing this kind of

intoxicated, it
sustained outrage and opposition.
Could the outrage of a few have pre-
vented the crime in Kathua?
Hate is not a problem only of the victim.

is like a heroin
We are all affected, more so those who
watch but don’t act. Take Afrazul’s killing
in Rajsamand. The Karwan went to the
killer’s (Shambhulal Regar’s) house to

high of hatred’
Harsh Mander, social activist and
former bureaucrat, started the Karwan-
e-Mohabbat last September to reach out
to victims of hate crimes. In an interview
with Pragya Singh, he says if India doesn’t
have leaders like Mahatma Gandhi we
will have to find courage to foster love and
fraternity ourselves. Edited excerpts.
Why does the Karwan-e-Mohabbat
exist? What does it aim to do?
The Karwan was a call to solidarity and
atonement against the mounting sense
of fear among minorities and our lack of
response to it. Muslims in particular are
experiencing a high degree of fear and
marginalisation. Muslim mothers are
telling sons not to say ‘salam aleikum’,
grow a beard or get into a fight, such is
their insecurity. Hate speech is being
normalised, as is prejudice against
Dalits and there are attacks in tribal
areas against Christians. I felt that we
have to reach out to our brothers and
sisters to tell them that they are not
alone, that we care and seek forgiveness,
for we are collectively responsible but
unable to prevent this.
In Kathua, a young Muslim girl has
been raped and murdered and crimi-
nal proceedings are mired in the lan-
guage of hatred. What explains this?
I hope the Kathua case is a turning
understand what motivated him. He
turned out to be a young man who had
a small business which collapsed after
demonetisation. Thereafter, he sat at
home and watched hate videos, getting
primed (for the crime). He wanted to
frightening reason is that people share kill some people only because they were
these sentiments of hate, so they have Muslim. Even this little girl in Kathua—
actually outsourced to the mob the work her only crime was that she was Muslim.
of acting out their hate. I was struck by how in Rajsamand nob­
The degree of hatred is unprecedented. ody responded to Afrazul’s killing. The
Why is this so? Karwan called a public meeting with the
I had never thought a day would come Hindu community, asked people if they at
when I would compare us unfavourably least worried about a boy of 14 (a Hindu)
with, say, the American people. Yet, who calmly filmed a man being hacked
Trump came to power and within a week and set on fire. So the hatred is enormous.
passed an order against people from seven And how did people answer that
Muslim countries. Within hours, people pointed question?
gathered in airports, put up posters There was a slight stirring, but overall
saying everybody is welcome, that ‘we I have found in our journeys—we have
are all Muslim’ and so on. Young lawyers been to ten states now—a kind of abs­
set up legal aid centres, ordinary people ence of any conscience or compassion
in the majority community. The kind of
outrage I would expect of humans has
dried up. Earlier, people would reach
out after riots. Today, the poison that
has been injected into the veins of our
society is toxic, heady and addictive.
Hum log ek tarah ke nashe mein hain—we
are intoxicated with hate. It is a crisis
of huge proportions that we are not
acknowledging.
Have we become a society that is in
some ways sick?
Yes. More than sick, the metaphor is
‘intoxicated’. We are on a heroin high
of hate. Illness or intoxication, both
can be resolved if we recognise them.
To find our capacities to love again is

point. It’s distressing that it required
something like this horror before we
outraged. Overall, the silence of the
majority needs to be questioned.
What explains the silence?
First, people are frightened to speak;
and there never has been this kind of
fear of speaking out in dissent. Secondly,
people don’t care: ‘I am not Muslim or
Dalit so how does it affect me?’ The most
“
“The majority is silent
also because many share I am convinced that this is not a battle
sentiments of hate, and
have outsourced to the
mob the work of acting
out their hatred.”
our biggest battle.
Right now, who is afraid of whom—
Hindus of Muslims or Muslims of
Hindus?
of Hindus and Muslims. The battle is
between the minority—those who use
religion for divisive hatred—and the
majority, who respect all faiths. But as
time passes I keep worrying if we are

30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 39

 COVER STORY INTERV I EW
still the majority or becoming a minor­
ity. We have to remain the majority or
we lose everything.
And one manifestation of hate is the
kind of violence perpetrated on the
girl in Kathua?
In lynching after lynching, the hatred
is extreme. Even in Asansol, the imam’s
16­year­old boy was not just killed but
his body was returned with nails pulled
out, eyes gouged, with multiple stab
wounds and partly burned. In Nagaon,
people said that two young boys were
cow thieves and the mob lynched them.
Again, the bodies were returned with
ears cut off, mutilated. In Bengal, three
lynched boys’ genitals had been crushed.
Kathua is an illustration of what kind
of hate this is. We are outraged by the
ministers and lawyers, but it is not the
first instance. In Akhlaque’s case, a cen­
tral minister draped one of the alleged
killers in the national flag.
Who is responsible for spreading
hate? Are we re-enacting pre-existing
animosities or is this something new?
We are seeing a hate fostered, generated
and legitimised from the highest levels.
India Spend, in a survey of cow­related
violence after 2010, found that 97 per
cent of attacks had happened after Mr
(Narendra) Modi came to power and 86
per cent of them are against Muslims,
eight per cent against Dalits. With lead­
ers like Trump, Modi and others, their
politics and personalities represent
hugely divided societies but they also
reflect, legitimise and amplify prejudice
and hatred in their politics, public utt­
erances and in their selective silences.
These leaders didn’t create that hatred
but they have legitimised it and given
us the freedom to act it out. It means
that deep in our souls we were carrying
this hatred and these leaders have dug
a deep tube­well that allows it to spout
out. Communal organisations like the
RSS and its associates have created this
hatred over generations and we have not
fought back as a society.
Why is it important to fight this?
If we go on like this, future generations
will ask what happened to us as a people,
why we remained silent. My German
friend told me that her 12­year­old
has a school project to find Jews killed
in his area and do a report. We have
also been through Partition, in which
a million people died. Have we dealt
with what hatred did up to that time?
40 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
We have not. Hatred has been allowed
to fester. The so­called secular political
parties are culpable too. The Congress is
selectively silent on this mounting hate.
Parties which claim to be sympathetic
to Muslims, the Samajwadi Party, the
Trinamool Congress, believe that app­
easing clerics and giving Hajj support to
imams is supporting the community. It
is not. Media is extremely culpable too.
They are part of this collective silence
and the legitimising of hatred without
resistance. Our education system, which
is preparing us for the market but not
worrying about us as human beings, is
also responsible.
What role are the administrators of
justice playing?
The police, prosecution and judiciary
at lower levels are acting in unison to
withhold justice. It is a very effective, sys­
tematic process. The Karwan has visited
over 100 families and we find victims
being criminalised in almost every cow
vigilante case. Pehlu Khan’s sons are
running around seeking anticipatory
bail, while the Alwar SP said they are cow Muslims what is being communicated
smugglers. These are very loose words. is that you are here under sufferance
The law requires you to get a permit when and are second­class citizens so cannot
transporting an animal for slaughter. It make claims for justice. Hence, ‘sabar
is undisputed that Pehlu was carrying karna zaroori hai’.
milk­giving cows, with calves, which you Recently, in Jharkhand, a lynching
would be crazy to slaughter—not that case was brought to speedy trial but
any cow smuggler deserves to be lynched. when the accused came to court hun-
The police act like lynch mobs in many dreds of supporters shouted slogans
encounter cases. in his favour. Is justice worthwhile if
Once a victim is cut off from justice, it polarises people?
what happens then? This is the dilemma for victims; this idea
After lynchings, Muslims are not even that we give up our claims for justice so
reaching out to the police now. They say that we can live together in peace is a false
sabar kar lenge—we will endure. This is dichotomy. Domestic violence victims are
the one big difference between attacks often told this too, but we are not looking
on Muslims and on Dalits. The Dalit is just for peace but for a just, authentic
fighting back and that gives us so much peace. Peace without justice is surrender.
hope. There is anger, assertion, you Yet, how do you look upon cases where
hear ‘Jai Bhim’, see mass conversion to polarisation grows after victims seek
Buddhism; they fight their cases. They justice?
still believe this is their country and In Jharkhand, the victim’s family, des­
they have the right to fight back. To pite fear, was not intimidated and we
had the enormous fortune of a fair­
“
minded judge and got the first convic­
tion in a lynching case. Despite a really
gruesome crime, Mariam, the victim’s
“Along with police, widow, said she wanted justice, not
there is pressure on capital punishment. You also hear the
victims from within the imam in Asansol and Ankit Saxena’s
father—these are people who represent
community. Muslims say an India which is still humane.
fight for justice will bring Why do Muslims fear seeking justice?
more persecution.” Along with what the police are doing,

there is pressure on victims from within
their community. One victim told us
that the Muslim sarpanch of her village
asked her to get her sons to rescind their
testimonies for the sake of bhaichara,
brotherhood. She said, ‘I don’t want
bhaichara, I want insaaf—justice.’ Mus­
lims tell us that if they fight for justice
they will only be persecuted more. We
are seeing this in the Kathua case—the
family pursues justice and there is
intimidation by lawyers, the local com­
munity. I believe that as a society we can
only live with justice and and rebuilding
relationships on the basis of equality.
Mahatma Gandhi had said that if a cat
attacks a mouse and at that moment
the mouse says ‘I forgive you’, that is not
forgiveness, the mouse had no choice.
In Mariam’s case, I think she has found
spaces for forgiveness after justice and
that is where we can begin.
Are you more hopeful or despairing
seven months after starting the
Karwan-e-Mohabbat?
The degree of horror and violence, the
absence of remorse, the celebration of
hate, the videotaping of attacks remind
me of lynchings of Black Americans.
Those, too, had become sites of public
entertainment. The victims’ famlies do
not understand why this is happening.
Somehow, Kathua has woken up people,
but we are passing through a very criti­
Photographs: JITENDER GUPTA
cal moment in our history.
After the Ankit Saxena case, there is
an accusation against activists that
you are soft on violence perpetrated
by the Muslims.
People ask me this all the time and this
is part of the reason why parties like the
Congress are silent. Who else are you
going to stand with if not the victims,
and why be defensive about it? Gandhiji
was told he is ‘Muslim­parast’ and he
responded, yes I am, and when I go to
Pakstan I will be Hindu­parast. In Ankit
Saxena’s case, when the BJP chief tried
to drive a communal rift, Yashpal Saxena,
the father, resisted. The imam in Asansol
showed exactly the same instinct, saying
it would be a greater tragedy if a single
Hindu is attacked. Yashpal likens the
imam to his brother. In all the despair
these people help us believe there is hope.
Is the Karwan effective in your view?
The Karwan is entirely crowd­funded.
“
“The difference between
attacks on Muslims and
Dalits is that the Dalit is
fighting back, giving us
hope. They believe in the
right to fight back.”
Mostly, Hindus contribute. It has tou­
ched many people but it has meant a huge
amount to Muslims. Writers, photogra­
phers, film­makers, through telling and
retelling their stories, have broken at least
some of the collective silences. At first
people used to say that these are a few
stray incidents which vested interests are
blowing up. Now, they recognise that this
is a pattern across India, that hundreds
of cases go unreported. The Kathua girl
is being mourned by thousands as if she
was our own daughter. This is the kind
of fraternity we have to foster. I will con­
tinue to do this as long as I don’t feel that
as a society we are not fighting back.
What are the solutions for hatred?
Love has become probably the most revo­
lutionary idea of our times. This idea that
we can foster love in the climate of hate
has become the most important battle.
Will eventually something like South
Africa’s truth and reconciliation be
necessary in India?
Through truth and reconciliation, South
Africa’s society tried to come to terms
with its histories of violence, something
we have not done. We should have had a
truth and reconciliation after Partition,
after 1984 and a range of other episodes—
Gujarat, Kandhamal, the collective atro­
cities against Dalits. We haven’t dealt as a
society with the injustices we have perpe­
trated. We have to recognise that it is not
something happening out there, that we
are culpable with our silent endorse­
ments, our lack of resistance. We have to
enter into our souls and discover how
much hatred there is in each of us. We
encounter levels of prejudice we never
dreamed existed among family, friends,
colleagues and cannot afford to push it
back under the carpet.
Who will have this dialogue?
In 1948, a million people had died in
Hindu­Muslim riots, a country had
been carved out on the basis of reli­
gion, amidst bloodshed, lakhs of angry
refugees had landed in Delhi. They had
occupied the Connaught Place mosque,
converted dargahs into temples and
were throwing Muslims out of their
homes. In the middle of this Mahatma
Gandhi said that this country belongs
equally to all. His last battle was to res­
tore mosques and dargahs to Muslims.
It is that courage we will have to find and
if we are not going to have leaders like
him, then we have to do it ourselves. We
have nowhere else to look. O
30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 41
 COVER STORY OPI NI ON

CORNED BEEF A
M.
RAJIVLOCHAN Post 1857, the British insisted on identifying Indians as two: Hindus,

T
Illustration by LEELA
HINGS believed to be real can have real
consequences. Nothing demonstrates this
better than communal conflict in India.
Once one is done accusing one or the other
community of being communal, one begins
to notice the sickening regularity with which
politicians and their groupies eagerly push this line
or that in order to further their short-term political
objectives. Nurturing and milking social fissures is
quite beneficial to some.
This is precisely what the British colonial rulers
did when they crafted for Indians a new social real-
ity by the turn of the 19th-20th century. Like
hoodlums who run large-scale protection rackets,
they positioned themselves as the only bulwark to
protect one community from launching into a
murderous assault on the other.
The British had insisted on identifying Indians as
Hindus and Muslims ever since 1857, when the sep- human societies for ever since we have recorded
oys of the Bengal army tried to overthrow British history. True, once in a while people have behaved
rule from India after the European officers insisted particularly badly with each other using religious
on demeaning their religious beliefs. All other iden- differences as an excuse. But that’s just how life is.
tifiers among Indians, like caste, region, culture, Religious distinctions have always existed between
language and class—the kind of identifiers that were people. To take a random example, poet Vidyapati,
so common when talking of the people of Europe— writing a poetical work in the 15th century set in the
were ignored in preference to religion. Even the Uttar Pradesh region, could say that “the Hindus and
tremendous diversity within the broad categories Turks lived together, each ridiculing the other’s reli-
Hindus and Muslims were ignored. gion. The chant from the Vedas mingled with the call
The fuzziness of religious beliefs and boundaries, of the muezzin. Meat shops sold two varieties of
the tremendous overlap in beliefs and religious animal flesh slaughtered differently according to
practices of Indians were underplayed. So much so Hindu and Muslim customs. There were different
that for the census enumeration of 1911, the census wards in the town for Hindus and Muslims…”. But
commissioner specifically instructed the staff to religious beliefs rarely affected secular decisions. In
ignore such indistinctness and put all Indians only the same poem, Vidyapati also tells us that Kirti-
in specific religious categories like Hindus and Musl- By the 20th simha, the raja of Mithila, saw no problem in app-
ims. Let there be no doubt, the British were carving century, the roaching Sultan Ibrahim Shah, the ruler of Jaunpur,
out a new social reality for Indians: one in which for help in recovering his lost kingdom. Nor did the
Hindus and Muslims were considered to be mortal
British had Sultan see an issue in extending that help.
enemies, one for which the people of Bengal and got Indians To take another example, Aurangzeb was behaving
Punjab would pay an inordinately high price in the to see each particularly badly towards Hindus in order to please
riots that accompanied independence in 1947. other as the the kathmullas of his court. In 1669, the Qazi of Surat
The British insisted, with no evidence, that Hindus enemy, and forced a Hindu merchant to convert, in order to
and Muslims could not get along with each other. please the Mughal emperor. “Look here,” the Qazi
This was neither here nor there since making fun of crafted a reminded this Hindu merchant, “some years ago you
each other’s belief systems, and insisting that one’s new social shared a watermelon with me, hence now you are a
own belief was superior, has been part of complex reality. Muslim.” All the merchants of Surat shut shop and

42 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

ND ROASTED PORK
Muslims. Those imagined communities have become part of our mental fabric.
departed the city at the Qazi’s perfidy.
The Mughal governor of the city, representing the
authority of the state of which Aurangzeb was the
emperor, was extremely displeased with the Qazi.
For him, as a representative of the state, raising taxes
was far more important than converting people. And
here was Surat town bereft of its wealth creators.
After tempers had cooled a little, the governor duly
sent embassies assuring the Hindu merchants that
such conversions would not happen, begging them
to come back. The merchants on their part showed
some grace and agreed to return, but only on assur-
ance that the meddlesome Qazi would be asked to
remain within his limits. The British who had already
set up a factory in Surat at this time watched the
entire drama with some wonderment.
What was new now in colonial times was that the
British insisted that Hindus and Muslims were int-
rinsically incompatible people who could never
exist together peacefully but for the mediation
provided by the colonial government.
Over the years, each religious group was also given
social attributes much in line with the racist attrib-
utes with which the British were familiar in Europe
and America. Thus meat-eating Muslims were
declared to be brave and warlike, as were Sikhs.
Hindus got classified as vegetarian, weak, pusillan-
imous, money-grubbing people. Such attributes
became so deeply accepted by Indian society that
we even have the teenager Mohandas Karamchand
Gandhi eating meat surreptitiously with a Muslim
friend in the hope of becoming fearless and strong.
Even while leading India-wide political movements
many years later, Gandhi would continue to talk of
the weak and perpetually scared Hindu in contrast
to the manly and brave Muslim.
British hegemony over the Indian mind was such
that many an English-educated Indian accepted
Hindu-Muslim animosity as the basic truth of life in
the country. The Indian National Congress, in its
very first session at Bombay in December 1885,
announced that it would work towards greater amity
between Hindus and Muslims though the country
had no history of communal conflict, barring stray
minor incidents. Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, the English-
speaking representative of the modern scientifically
minded Muslim, on his side wrote a longish essay
warning Muslims to keep away from the Congress
lest they be overwhelmed by the Hindus.
I
N 1905, as the people of India got together to pro-
test against the partition of Bengal, the Nawab of
Dhaka brought together a handful of graduates
from the Mahomedan Anglo Oriental College at
Shimla to announce the formation of the Muslim
League. That was to safeguard the interests of Indian
Muslims as also to demand that the government
create a university specifically for Muslims. The time
was opportune since John Morley, the then Secretary
of State for India, a well-known liberal, had fre-
quently opined about the dangers of the majority in
India and the need for providing separate electorates
to Muslims in order to safeguard Muslim interests.
A university based on religion, however, was as yet
anathema to the liberal and modernising British.
They rejected this idea on the ground that they ran a
secular government which did not allow the creation
of denominational universities.
A decade later, the demand for Swaraj began to get
mass support through popular participation in the
Non-Cooperation movement that Gandhi had
started. Hindus and Muslims joined the movement
without bothering about their religion. Even the
students and faculty of the Mahomedan Anglo-
Oriental College went on a strike in support of
Non-Cooperation, and started a nationalist col-
lege—the Jamia Millia. To this, the government, at
its own initiative, decided to create the Aligarh
Muslim University out of the Mahomedan Anglo-
Oriental College even though there was no demand
Essential for it at the moment. The Muslim League, already
traits were hostile to the Non-Cooperation movement and
Gandhi, chose to stand out in support of the govern-
ascribed to ment and against the idea of Swaraj.
religious In modern India, imagined communities are part
groups. To of our mental fabric. Today, if the Indian state
be Muslim chooses to take sides in cases like Kathua, it will be
was to be asserting that beliefs matter far more than reality or
justice. Colonisation of the mind is far more difficult
‘warlike’, to fight than any physical dominion. O
and Hindus (The writer is professor of history,
were ‘weak’. Panjab University.)
30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 43
 COVER STORY
‘WHAT A
WASTE OF
MUD AND
FILTH THEY
WILL LEAVE
BEHIND THEM’
Tagore’s foreboding about the
aftermath of empire proved all
too prophetic, not just for India,
but for post-colonial states at
large. The magic formula ‘divide
et impera’ left communities in
many of these countries bitterly
polarised, often with some
sections resenting others—
generally minorities—for having
been patronised by the colonial
state. Differences and historical
divisions, coaxed out by imperial
midwifery, came to the fore in
the narratives being constructed.
Arbitrary borders left some
communities split between
states, and forced others to live
with hated neighbours.
All this would erupt in the wake
of independence in the 20th
century, leading to civil war,
ethnic cleansing and some of
history’s most terrible genocides.
Many of the resulting communal
conflicts have continued in hot
and cold phases and show no
signs of abating, as seen in the
ongoing Syrian Civil War and the
Israel-Palestine impasse.
44 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
LEBANON The civil war in Lebanon began
in 1975 and continued till 1990, resulting
in the death of close to 1,20,000 people.
The French controlled the West Asian
country between 1920 and 1943, favouring
the Christians in a Muslim-majority
country. Many pan-Arabic and left-leaning
forces who allied with the Palestinians
were against the succeeding government,
which they thought was pro-Western.
PALESTINE A Jewish state
became a realistic
proposition after the British
betrayed their promise to
the Arabs (who they were
inciting to rebel against the
Ottomans) via the infamous
Balfour Declaration of 1917.
Europe virtually exported its
‘Jewish problem’ to the
Middle East with Israel’s
creation in 1948; this was
followed by a Palestinian
exodus and a crisis that is
still ongoing, with no
resolution in sight.
RWANDA The African country was
controlled by the Germans before
Belgium took control in 1916 during
WWI. The Belgians favoured the
minority Tutsis against the majority
Hutus, giving them more power in
administration. The Belgians left the
country due to anti-colonial sentiment
in 1962. In 1994, the country witnessed
one of history’s worst genocides when
the Hutus slaughtered Tutsis, followed
by a counter-genocide. A recent report
says over 2 million died in the violence.
SYRIA After WWI, Syria became a de-facto
colony of France, and while the French were
supposed to prepare it for independence, they
created geographical divisions and also
divided Syrian society. They tried to impose
French and Catholicism later, and appealed to
minority groups to rule over the majority,
later resorting to bombing Damascus. Shaken
by the Arab Spring, the country has been in a
state of civil war since 2011.
IRAQ In 1921, eleven years before they
left the country, the British installed King
Faisal as the ruler of Iraq. Faisal was seen
as part of the Sunni elite, who formed the
minority compared to the majority Shias.
Under Saddam Hussein’s rule, Shias were
persecuted, and following the Iraq war in
2004 and Saddam’s death, the country
has witnessed a spate of revenge killings
by the two communities.
AFGHANISTAN The country was a pawn in
the ‘Great Game’ between Britian and
Russia over control, and the former
sketched out the Durand Line as the
border separating Afghanistan from India
in 1893. An Anglo-Russian convention
agreed on the idea in 1907, leading to the
Pashtun community being cut in half. The
Pashtuns are deeply mired in the country’s
internecine conflicts today.

MYANMAR Formerly Burma, the country

was administered along with India until
1937, and gained independence from British
rule in 1948. Colonial powers had
encouraged migrant labour for rice
cultivation, and the population of Muslims
tripled during 1871 and 1911. After they
sided with the British during the war, an
autocratic government declared the
Rohingya Muslims illegal in 1977,
leading to one of the worst immigration
crises of modern times.

INDIA The British had apparently been

perplexed at the Hindus and Muslims
fighting alongside each other during the
1857 rebellion. Subsequently, they
imposed divide-and-rule, polarising the
communities, and asked for people’s
religion during the census. The
insecurities fomented led to Muslims
demanding a separate state of Pakistan
(following the creation of the Muslim
League in 1907), to riots which killed
thousands across borders during the
PAKISTAN Pakistan was Partition and the issue of Kashmir, which
cleaved out of India following continues to be a bone of contention.
a demand from a section of
the Muslim community after
the British stoked tensions
between communities. 14
million were displaced in the
one of the largest mass
migrations in history, plagued
with instances of rioting.

INDONESIA Indonesia,
which had formed part of
the erstwhile Dutch East
Indies, experienced the
Maluku sectarian conflict
MAURITIUS The island nation was between 1999 and 2002.
under French and Dutch control until Experts say that Dutch
1810, when the British took control. policies in the archipelago
Communal riots between the had set the stage for the
SRI LANKA The seeds of the Sinhalese-Tamil conflict
Muslims, who formed the third- conflict between the
were sown long ago, following British occupation in 1815.
largest community, and the Creoles, Christians and the
A legislative council with equal representation for both
the second-largest, erupted in 1968 Muslim community,
communities was established in 1833, leading to
when the country attained its which was described as
polarising rhetoric. Post-independence, majority
independence from British rule. In all-out warfare against
Sinhalese governments, retaliating against the perceived
1999, the Creole community clashed the civilian population by
favouring of the Tamil community during colonial rule,
with the majority Hindus after a militants of both faiths.
implemented discriminatory policies, leading to
Reggae star was killed in custody.
escalation, the LTTE and civil war in the 20th century.

Compiled by SIDDHARTHA MISHRA; Graphic by SAJI C.S.

 COVER STORY OPINI ON

RAPE DOESN’T
DR R.
HAVE A COLOUR
BALASHANKAR Kathua was a barbaric crime. Don’t drag politics into it.

T
HE rape and murder of eight-year-old Asifa in Kathua is and Unnao will get justice at any cost,” declared the PM in res-
one of the most macabre, gruesome crimes in a long list of ponse to a nationwide outcry. With the general election only a
atrocities against women in India. Such incidents have year away, political parties will naturally try to get as much
become a daily nightmare, and some reactions make us mileage as possible out of this. But the sabka saath sabka vikas
wonder if we are descending into an archaic tribalism. promise of the Modi government is to deliver justice for all.
It is shocking that some found a chance to play politics and Is there any aspect of the Kathua crime that needs reappraisal?
inject religion into this crime that stirred the nation’s psyche. It is as clear as day that the perpetrators deserve no mercy. It
The PM was right when he said the incident had shamed the would be unimaginable even in the Stone Age for somebody to
whole country. After Modi proclaimed that none would be get away with such a beastly act. In 21st-century India, such
spared, two BJP ministers in the J&K government (both recent criminals should be ostracised and socially shamed. They should
Congress defectors), who’d defended the accused, lost their jobs. not be allowed to walk free by donning the façade of religion.
The rape of a young girl in Unnao, UP, allegedly by a BJP MLA, This should also not be allowed to strain relations between the
and the murder of the girl’s father in police custody, hit the BJP and the PDP. A crime against humanity cannot be an issue
headlines simultaneously. It seemed that only criminals could on which parties stand separate.
make it big in life, and that such success was merely licence to There is a context to this. The BJP was voted into power in 2014
further their profession. The BJP again took tough measures: when atrocities against women, lawlessness and corruption had
the accused was expelled from the party and is now in CBI cus- become a way of life under the UPA. Narendra Modi had made
tody. The PM spoke out at the earliest opportunity, so that there beti bachao, beti padhao a major plank of his campaign. Since
would be no scope for politics in such a then, the Modi government has initiated
heinous crime; it has now become routine more schemes and done more than any
to draw Modi’s name even into incidents The two ministers were other government in the past to empower
which are simply local in nature. Congress defectors. women. The Opposition’s approach is to
There are conflicting reports about the paint the Modi government as being no
Kathua crime. Initially, it was attributed Nobody knows how they different from previous ones. This was
to the girl’s relatives. Then, it was reported suddenly became articulated by Rahul Gandhi when he led
that she had been held captive by a priest Hindutva votaries. a midnight march to the India Gate on
at a religious site, and that local policemen April 13. The concern was less about the
were involved. The post-mortem report plight of the victims of Unnao and Kathua
did not reveal rape. Many plots and theories have been spun into than it was about scoring brownie points.
the crime since it occurred in January. Religious outfits sprang It will take time for the whole truth to come out. Social media
into action to protect the accused. There were suggestions that is full of stories pointing at the Congress having had a hand in
the combative politics of the ruling coalition, social distress and creating the mayhem surrounding the Kathua crime. There are
the communal divide also came into play. It was alleged that people who vouch that the priest, temple and Hindu angle are
Muslim officers from Kashmir tried to frame Hindus for the later interpolations to a straightforward crime episode. The girl
crime. Kathua locals and a section of the J&K Bar Association was orphaned and living with her aunt, and the simmering
also jumped into the fray, provoking a warning from the SC. feeling in the region against the Rohingyas, who were settled
It is unacceptable and unjustified to condone the heartless, there by Ghulam Nabi Azad when he was CM, also had its role to
satanic act with a veil of religious anarchism. The most appalling play. The two controversial leaders, Lal Singh and Chandar
audacity is to give it the colour of Hinduism. This is the most Prakash Ganga, were in the Congress before they joined the BJP.
cultured, peace-loving and tolerant of religions, and it places the They are said to be loyal to Azad, and nobody knows how they
dignity of women on the highest pedestal. Like the misguided suddenly became Hindutva votaries. Is Azad planning to
cow vigilantes, those who rape and murder a child in the name re-enter the arena in Jammu? The crime apart, the politics being
of religion should be dealt with harshly. The Congress in Jammu, played out in its name needs to be keenly watched. But it will be
with an eye on the votebank, also took a wishy-washy stance. As too late when the full inquiry reveals the real culprits. O
far as ensuring justice for Asifa is concerned, no religious con- (The writer was editor of Organiser, and is a member of the
siderations should stand in the way. “The daughters of Kathua BJP’s national committees on publications.)

46 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

changing gears
New entrants must recognise that the aspirations
of the Indian customer are sky high. As an
automaker, you discount that at your own risk…
The Indian car market continues to grow
and attract new automakers – with Kia
and MG being the latest entrants – but
it remains largely dominated by a single
player. Despite an attempted onslaught
by pretty much every global carmaker
on the planet, Maruti-Suzuki still rules
half the market – which is staggering
when you consider that India is now the
fourth largest car market in the world.
Hyundai is the only other
manufacturer to have a market share
of any significance – which is to say
in double digits. Mahindra (7.5%),
Tata (6%), Honda (5.5%), Toyota
(4%) and Renault (3.5%) make up
small portions of the pie, while VW
– the erstwhile largest automaker in
the world, until the Renault-Nissan
Alliance added Mitsubishi to its fold
recently – has just a measly 1.5%
share of the market.
The question is, then, what can the
likes of Kia and MG really hope to
achieve? Well, if they come in looking
to compete on cost at the expense
of quality – in the hope for volumes
– they’re likely to befall a familiar
fate. But it’s not just cost cutting, or
compromising on quality, because
VW has the highest product quality
in many of the segments in which it
competes. It, on the other hand, has
been handicapped by an inability to
get a handle on a rouge dealer network
that makes the aftersales experience
a nightmare for its customers.
Kia and MG are investing thousands
of crores in the country – 7,000 and
2,000 respectively (with the promise
of another 3,000 crores from MG if all
goes according to plan) – so they’ll
undoubtedly be keen to see returns
sooner rather than later. But they first
need to work on getting all the pieces
of the puzzle right – quality, styling,
positioning, dealer network, aftersales
experience, etc. It would behove
them to take a long-term view of their
investment rather than expect quick
returns. After all, there are no second
chances in the Indian market. And,
seeing that this market’s importance
will only continue to grow in future,
getting the fundamentals right is
crucial for any new entrant.
MG has the benefit of a great deal
of India-market experience in its top
management, not to mention the deep
pockets of its Chinese parent, SAIC,
while Kia can learn much from the
success of its parent brand, Hyundai,
in India.
The most important thing that both
new entrants can do is recognise that
the aspirations of the Indian customer
are sky high. As an automaker, you
discount that at your own risk…
Dhruv Behl, Editor
@dhruv_behl | dbehl@autox.com
Connect with us:
@autoX @autoXmag autoXmag autoXTV
 industry news
Mg Motors lays down india plans
M
G Motor India has announced
its aggressive business
plans for the Indian market.
The SAIC-owned company has
committed to investing `2,000 crores
in its first phase of development, and
has envisioned investing as much as
`5,000 crores total in the country over
a span of the next six years if all goes
according to plan. SAIC (Shanghai
Automotive Industry Corporation),
meanwhile, manufactured 7 million
vehicles last year, with a total turnover
over $110 billion.
In July 2017, MG Motor announced
that it would be entering the Indian
automobile market by 2019. Then, in
September, the company inaugurated
its manufacturing facility in Halol,
Gujarat. The Halol plant is GM India’s
former plant, which ceased operations
after GM decided to abruptly pull the
plug on sales in India. GM still
operates its Talegaon plant in
Maharashtra, from where it exports
vehicles to other markets. Interestingly,
both Rajeev Chaba, President and
MD, as well as P Balendran, Executive
Director, MG Motor India, are former
GM executives.
The upgradation of the Halol plant
includes the construction of a new
press shop and the modification of
assembly lines and other facilities.
MG Motor India has also initiated
talks with various suppliers to set up
a vendor park around Halol to aid its
effort of achieving high levels of
localisation. Chaba announced that
they plan to have 80% localisation
right from the get go.
MG Motor India claims to have
already recruited more than 150
people in the last five months, and
further aims to expand its workforce
to around 1,000 by the end of 2018.
Furthermore, MG also plans to set up
as many as 300 customer touch-
points over the next few years.
MG Motor has also announced that
its first vehicle in India will be
launched ahead of schedule within
the first three months of 2019. Going
forward, the company plans to
introduce one new product to the
Indian market every year.
Adhering to the current demand for
SUVs and crossovers, MG has
decided to launch an SUV as its
debut model in India. We reckon that
the company would likely introduce
the ZS (pictured above), a small SUV
that debuted in 2017. The ZS is a
Hyundai Creta sized car, which is the
first model in MG’s global line up to
incorporate the company’s new
design philosophy. In the UK, this car
starts at £12,495 (~`11.40 lakh).
For the uninitiated, MG (Morris
Garages) is a British automotive
marque that was originally established
in 1924. The name MG was once
synonymous with roadsters, and was
a big part of popular culture right from
World War II up to the 70s. However,
after an aftermath of prolonged
losses, the company went bankrupt in
2005 and was re-established as MG
Motor in 2006 by China-based SAIC
– which has global aspirations for the
brand once again.
 & hoW do They compaRe?
Kia made a big splash at the recently concluded Auto Expo
and truly whet our appetite for the shape of things to come.
But what’s coming when, and how does it compare?
Here’s a closer look at what to expect.
words: Dhruv Behl // photography: Kapil vashist & ishan raghava

B
efore we begin this
feature, and attempt to
describe what it is, first,
what it isn’t – this isn’t a
comparison between two
Kias and a handful of machines
already on the market.
To begin with, these two Kias – the
Rio hatchback and the Sportage SUV
– haven’t even been launched in the
market. In fact, as yet, we don’t even
know if these two models will eventually
be launched. We’ll get into the details in
the following pages, suffice to say that
Kia made a big splash by showcasing
16 global models at the recently
concluded auto expo – which got a lot
of people very excited about the brand’s
entry into India (albeit a bit late in the
day)!
The star of their showcase at the
expo – along with the beautiful and
svelte Stinger sports sedan – was, of
course, the global debut of the Sp
concept SUV.
here’s what we know already
Kia signed an moU with the andhra
pradesh government in april 2017 to
invest $1.1 billion in a 536-acre
greenfield manufacturing facility that will
have the capacity to produce 300,000
vehicles. a subsequent announcement
has pledged an additional 100,000 units
in future, along with a promised total
investment of $2 billion by 2021. at
present, construction is proceeding at a
frenzied pace and the plant is running
one month ahead of schedule. Kia
certainly took its time to get here, but it
appears that they’re preparing
themselves to well and truly take the
fight to the market.
The beautiful, and futuristic, Sp
Concept SUV will be the first machine
to roll off the assembly line in September
next year if all goes according to plan.

so, who is Kia?

Kia is part of the hyundai motor Group
– now the fifth largest manufacturer in
the world. hyundai, of course, is a
company that we know very well in
this neck of the woods – as it’s grown
to become the largest passenger car
exporter and second largest
manufacturer in India. Kia, however,
is much less known – many even
think it’s an australian brand since it’s
been the lead sponsor for the
australian open tennis Grand Slam
since 2002.
Kia was founded in 1944 as a
manufacturer of bicycle parts in Korea.
It then went on to make motorcycles
and three-wheeled vehicles. In 1974, it
 The reason we chose to feature the Sportage and the
Rio is because they’re Kia’s two best selling models
worldwide. In fact, the Sportage just celebrated a bit
of a milestone – five million cumulative sales since it
was first introduced in 1993.

launched South Korea’s first production
car. In 1986, in partnership with Ford,
Kia launched its first mass-market
overseas model. By the late ‘90’s,
however, the Asian financial crisis had
taken a toll on the company, and, in
1998, hyundai acquired a majority
stake in Kia.
Today, hyundai owns a little over
30% – making it the largest shareholder
in Kia. The two companies share R&d
facilities, such as the 12,000-people
strong Namyang centre a couple hours
out of Seoul.
how closely related are hyundai
and Kia cars?
To benefit from economies of scale,
hyundai and Kia share up to seven
platforms. however, they go to great
lengths to ensure that not only do the
eventual models look different but
also that they each have their own
individual character. Internationally,
hyundai is positioning itself as being
more premium and refined, whereas
Kia is more youthful and vibrant. The
positioning for India, however, still
isn’t clear.
how do i recognise a Kia?
Well, through their distinctive “tiger-
nose” grille of course! Kias are known
for their sharp and aggressive designs.
In fact, they’ve won over 50 major
design awards over the past many
years thanks to the leadership of peter
Schreyer.
peter Schreyer is one of the most
respected car designers of our time –
best known for his design of the original
audi TT. he’s been the chief design
Officer at Kia since 2006, and has since
gone on to become president and chief
Design Officer of the Hyundai Motor
Group as a whole. his move to Kia in
2006, after 25 years at the VW Group,
was considered quite a coup for the
Korean manufacturer.
When asked about the difference in
the character of the two brands, here’s
what Schreyer had to say, “hyundai is
more like the charismatic leader,
because it’s the mother company, and
Kia is more the youthful challenger. So,
Kia is a bit more vibrant and hyundai is
a bit more classic. hyundai has a more
sensuous form language. hyundai is
more like a drop of water – so, if you
think of how nature forms a river stone.
In our design manifesto, Kia is a little
more tech driven. Kia is more like a
snow crystal, which is more of an
architectural object. So,
for Kia, we always stress on the
simplicity of the straight line – something
that is very clean, clear and
architectural, whereas hyundai
is a bit more sensuous.”
What about Kia’s quality?
a decade ago, Kia’s quality was well
below the industry standard. Recently,
however, Kia ranked number one
(ahead of porsche in second place) in
 When it comes
to quality and
features, Hyundai
has upped the
game in many of
the segments in
which it operates
– and we expect
Kia to push
the boundaries
even further
the JD Power Initial Quality Survey –
which was the first time in almost 30
years that a mainstream brand topped
the charts. Kia is also known for
standing behind its machines with a
seven-year warranty – which, if retained
in India, would be a first and would be
a great competitive advantage for the
brand when it officially launches its cars
next year.
When it comes to quality and
features, Hyundai has upped the
game in many of the segments in
which it operates – and we expect Kia
to push the boundaries even further.
The overall refinement and quality
levels are very similar in both sets of
machines – the Tucson and i20 from
Hyundai and the Rio and Sportage
from Kia. Presumably, you’ve figured
out by now that the Rio and i20, and
the Tucson and Sportage, share the
same platforms. There are some
added niceties in the Rio however.
For instance, it has soft-touch door
pads as opposed to the hard plastic
door trim pieces in the i20 – and all
the other cars in this segment for that
matter. Keep in mind, though, that
these Kia models are in their global
spec and are likely to change when
the cars are manufactured in India.
On the whole, though, quality levels
are very high indeed – certainly higher
than the Baleno in the case of the Rio,
and even the Compass when
compared with the Sportage. And if
these quality levels are maintained,
the expectation certainly is that Kia
will come command a slight premium.
What about style?
As Peter Schreyer says, Kia is more
youthful and exuberant – and it shows.
The “tiger-nose” grille is aggressive,
while the other lines are taut and clean.
There are some additional niceties too,
such as the four LED ‘ice cube’ fog lights
on the Sportage. On the inside too, the
Kias feel edgier than the two Hyundais.
Both the i20 and the Tucson have two-
tone beige interiors (which the Indian
market seems to love) that feel distinctly
grown up and refined. Both Kias,
however, have all-black cabins that feel
much sportier than their brethren – and
actually feel closer in character to the
Maruti and Jeep. I especially like the
seats in the Sportage, as well as the flat-
bottom steering wheel in this GT-Line
trim. Where this duo of Kias aren’t quite
at the same level as the Hyundais with
which they share their underpinnings is
in their infotainment system. Both Kias
have fairly basic systems, while the top-
of-the-line Hyundais have all moved to
large and slick touchscreens.
What about on the road?
Here’s where things start to get really
interesting – because that youthful and
exuberant, sporty even, character is
very much translated to the road. The
steering has a slightly weightier feel and
is certainly a lot sharper than the
equivalent Hyundai – so too are the
brakes and the overall feel of both
machines. In the Rio, though, this
comes at a heavy price. Its 205/45 R17
Continental Conti Sport Contact tyres
and firm suspension give it amazing
handling and road holding of course, but
the resulting ride is a tad too firm for our
roads. Of course, the ride height and
suspension will be tweaked dramatically
for the India-spec models – which, in
some ways, is a shame since it means
that the India-spec Kias will likely lose
this sharp edge to an extent. At present,
the suspension set up feels very
European – which is to say very driver-
centric. In fact, it has the same character
that we came to love from the first
generation BMWs in India – before they
became floaty and soft like they are
now. In this instance, the Rio feels more
like the Baleno than the i20 – as the
Maruti is that little bit sharper and more
direct than the Hyundai, which is more
tuned towards comfort.
The Sportage too has a slightly
heavier and more precise steering than
the Tucson, but, on the whole, it feels
very similar in character, especially
since both cars share the same
drivetrain – a punchy 2.0-litre turbo-
diesel mated to a six-speed automatic
transmission. Here, as well, though the
Sportage – fitted with 19-inch rims,
versus 18s on the Hyundai – feels that
little bit firmer and more rewarding to
drive, while the Tucson feels just as
capable but more grown up and tuned
towards comfort.
The Jeep, on the other hand, will be
far more capable than both off-road,
but isn’t quite as refined on the road
– especially when you consider the
diesel clatter that pervades the cabin
of the Compass versus the more
muted hum of the Korean machines.
Here again, though, the Tucson is
pricier than the fully-loaded Jeep –
and the expectation is that Kia will
position their cars at a slight premium
to the equivalent Hyundai models.
 The Sportage has a
slightly heavier and
more precise steering
than the Tucson, but,
on the whole, it feels
very similar in
character – especially
since both cars share
the same drivetrain.
The Jeep, on the other
hand, will be far more
capable than both off-
road, but isn’t quite as
refined on the road.

Where this duo of Kias aren’t

quite at the same level as the
Hyundais with which they
share their underpinnings is in
their infotainment system. Both
Kias have fairly basic systems,
while the top-of-the-line
Hyundais have all moved to
large and slick touchscreens.
 The Rio feels more like the Baleno than the i20 – as the
Maruti is that little bit sharper and more direct than the
Hyundai, which is more tuned towards comfort

Kia’s first model in India, come September

2019, will be a production car based on the
SP Concept SUV that made its global
debut at the Auto Expo. It’s based on the
Creta chassis and will likely get the same
drivetrains, which will put it right in the
heart of the still emerging SUV market.

Whereas, globally, Hyundai – as the
parent brand – is positioned at a
premium to Kia, this positioning may not
necessarily work in India – especially
initially, as Kia builds up the local content
of their cars. Take Mexico, for instance,
where the brand was launched in 2015
– in Mexico, Kia is perceived to be a
relatively premium brand.
In India too, this could sit well with
their slightly edgy and more youthful
brand image – not to mention excellent
quality levels – as they seek to build
volumes and grow the local content in
their cars.
So, when can I buy one?
As we said before, at this stage, we don’t
know if Kia will launch either the Rio or
the Sportage in India. The Rio is now
also available in sedan form, so that may
be an option as well. The Sportage,
meanwhile, seems the likelier choice, as
SUVs are the flavour of the month and
not as price sensitive as the hatchback
segment. Moreover, the Sportage got a
very positive response at the expo. That
said, the Tucson hasn’t necessarily been
met with as much of a favourable
reception as Hyundai would have liked.
But that could be because Hyundai is
known as a small car manufacturer in
India, while Kia’s starting with a clean
slate from an image standpoint.
That apart, we know for sure that Kia
will be launching another SUV – the SP
Concept, based on the Creta chassis
and with the same drivetrains, which will
be right in the heart of the still emerging
SUV market.
The SP Concept, we expect, will not
only be stylish but also feature-rich and
cutting edge. While this new SUV is a
global product, it’s been developed very
much with the Indian market in mind.
The SP Concept should roll off the
assembly line in Andhra Pradesh in
September next year. One more model,
at the very least, will also be launched
at the same time. A year later, following
the launch of Hyundai’s sub-four-metre
SUV, a Kia model built on the same
platform will follow. At a minimum, two
new models will be launched every year
as Kia builds its dealership network to
cover 120 cities by 2020.
Spending a few days with these
machines in our conditions taught us a
couple of things – it reinforced our belief
that Kias are stylish, fun and well built.
Needless to say, it has genuinely whet
our appetite as we wait for the rollout of
India-spec models next year.
 AN ANNUAL SURVEY BY

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 HIV PROGRESS
by Arushi Bedi

T
O an observer’s eye, the long lines
at the Ram Manohar Lohia Hos-
pital in Delhi every Friday seem
much of a piece with the usual
crowds to be found outside any
government medical institution.
But this is different. Friday is the day
most HIV-positive people registered
with the hospital come to collect their
antiretroviral therapy (ART) drugs for
the month. They blend into the crowd
with no distinction, waiting in line for
their turn like everybody else. The dis-
ease that distinguishes them from oth-
ers is often not mentioned, or is spoken
of in low whispers between patients

SAVED,
familiar with each other’s history. Most
don’t want it to be known that they are
HIV-positive or, worse, have one of the
most incurable and most stigmatised
diseases in the world, AIDS.

YET
The way HIV/AIDS is viewed medica­
lly has changed miraculously in the last
three decades. Steady developments in
medicine, and timely introduction of such

SHAMED
medicines, mean that the disease is now
considered fairly manageable and not
much different from, say, diabetes. The
National AIDS Control Organisation’s
(NACO) programme, started in 1992, has
made strides in managing the disease by
providing treatment, testing facilities and
counselling. More than 60 per cent of all
India trims the annual increase of
HIV­positive individuals seek treatment HIV/AIDS cases by 57 per cent since
from government centres, bringing them
into a well­defined system that provides
2000. But social stigma lives on.
antiretroviral therapy (ART) to those aff­
ected. Although there are still about 21.17
lakh people living with the disease in
India, the number of new infections ann­ he would never find a wife. Neither par­
ually has gone down by 57 per cent since ent was brought in to be counselled about
2000. Yet, the associated social stigma has “Most campaigns the disease. Most people still attach a
shown no signs of abating—patients con­ carnal nature to HIV, believing that only
tinue to be ostracised even after all the said that having homosexuals and those who frequent sex
awareness campaigns. It’s telling that not workers get it. That’s the reason there is
a single person we spoke to for this story sex with people you so much secrecy surrounding the con­
wanted to be named or photographed. dition—most of those living with it don’t
Prayag, a 27­year­old HIV­positive man, were not married to even inform their family or friends.
lives alone in Delhi’s Sarai Kale Khan
area. He says he contracted HIV after caused AIDS. Most The main cause of this, according to
Lakshmi, an HIV/AIDS activist, is that
donating blood at a local hospital. While
Prayag did get the counselling required people aren’t even people don’t understand the spread of the
disease well. “Most anti­AIDS campaigns,
to initiate him into the HIV programme,
he did not dare tell his parents or relatives aware of what it even by the government during the initial
phase, said that having sex with people
that he had the disease. When he finally
summoned up the courage to do so last does to your body.” whom you were not married to caused
AIDS. A majority of people aren’t aware
year, his father stopped speaking to him, of other ways one can contract the dis­
and his mother was worried about how ease, or even of what it does to your body,”

56 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018


she says. Those who learn that they are
HIV­positive usually assume they have
been handed a death warrant, despite the
disease being easily manageable today.
Sita, a 35­year­old living in Bombay,
felt exactly this way. She had been expe­
riencing weakness and weight loss for a
few months before her mother pushed
her to get herself checked. They discov­
ered that Sita, whose husband had left
her a few months ago and eloped with
another woman, was HIV­positive. The
stories Sita had heard about people with
AIDS from her village were all so dire
that she was certain she was going to die
soon. She was then taken to a counselling
centre, and it took days for the counsel­
lor to explain to her that the disease was
manageable if only she took her drugs on
Illustrations by SAJITH KUMAR
time. “Had the counsellor not explained
things to me, I would probably have killed
myself,” she tells Outlook.
Counsellors and support helpers have
one of the toughest jobs in the HIV/AIDS
circuit. Vinod Mehra, a support helper
working with the Delhi Network for Pos­
itive People (DNP+), an NGO, ensures
that people get their ART on time from
government dispensaries, often accom­
panies them to the hospital, and provides
counselling to the patients and families.
“It is a tough job, but I know that I’m
probably the only person these patients
trust,” he says, adding that he is often one
of the few people who know that a patient
is living with the condition.
NACO’s whole programme is designed
so as to look at entire target groups to
Manish Yadav, 44
and Madhu, 40,
residents of a village in
Noida, have been living with
HIV since 2017. In January
2017, Madhu started feeling
unwell and lost over ten kilo­
grams in two months. After
going from hospital to hos­
pital, she was finally asked
to take the HIV test, which
came out positive. This led to
Manish being tested too, and
he also got a positive result.
Though neither of them
knows how they got the dis­
ease, they were referred to a
psychologist, who gave them
counselling and arranged for
them to get their medicines
at an ART centre. Manish
says that he picked up the
courage to tell his family only
about seven months ago.
To their relief, the relatives
took the news in good spirit.
Madhu says this is because of
the growing understanding of
the disease in their village.
reduce instances of the disease in a more
wholesale manner. These are groups
of people who are more likely to con­
tract the disease, and primarily include
sex workers, truckers, drug users and
pregnant women who display high­risk
behaviour. According to Dr R.S. Gupta,
deputy director­general, NACO, this
form of targeted intervention is useful
for disseminating knowledge as well as
for tracking the progress of those regis­
tered as HIV­positive. “This helps us not
only provide proper medical care to the
patients, but also to ensure that they are
taking the precautions necessary to avoid
the further spread of the disease,” he says.
Such targeted intervention has shown
results. Take sex workers, for instance.
Many find that red­light areas are no
30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 57
 H I V P ROGRES S

Rajini and
Kuljeet,
a couple living in Delhi,
found out they had HIV in
2010, after Kuljeet fell ill with
tuberculosis and had to be
given about 14 kg of oxygen
at the government hospital
close to their house. Both say
they knew little about HIV,
but the more they learnt, the
more scared they grew to
confront family and friends.
They have two children aged
14 and 16, both unaware that
their parents are HIV­pos­
itive. The only person who
knows is their counsellor.
They have no intention of
telling their family or friends
as they fear being ostracised.
Every time they have to go
to the hospital because of
a complication, they must
make excuses. Rajini, who
runs a parlour from home,
says business isn’t going well,
as she often doesn’t have the
energy to work.

longer high­risk zones for the spread of
the disease. “The counselling and inter­
vention for the disease in this area has
been the highest since the beginning of
the programme,” says a ground­level
worker in Delhi. “Sex workers, we have
observed, are far more likely to take rep­
eated tests and the precautions necessary
to not contract the disease because of the
nature of their jobs. This is why we see
one of the fewest numbers of new cases
of both adults and children born with
HIV in such areas,” he says. Lakshmi
points to another reason: “Women talk
very openly and are not afraid of sharing
their stories and problems. They become
more tight­lipped in situations where rel­
atives are involved, because of the fear of
being judged,” she says. Gupta, however,
says that outreach efforts in the sex wor­
ker community remain incomplete, and
that they remain a target group for gov­
ernment interventions.
Counselling and But there has been far less progress
when it comes to groups not considered
intervention have high­risk, such as housewives or workers
in other sectors. “No work is being done
reduced the spread in educating housewives or those who
have only one sexual partner,” says Anjali
of HIV among sex Gopalan, founder and executive director
workers, but of Naz Foundation, an NGO. “This means
that every time a married woman con­
“no work is being tracts the disease, she is left wondering
how she got it, without any knowledge on
done in educating how to live with it. Children and women
are completely left out from the discourse
housewives.” on AIDS in the country,” she says.
The distribution and access to antiret­
roviral therapy is also often fraught with
problems. More than 90 per cent of all

58 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018


Maya, 40,
a housemaid from Cha­
ndigarh, found that she had
the disease eight years ago.
She knew that she had got
it from her then­husband.
“I was so angry with him
for putting me through this
that I decided to leave him
and start a life of my own,”
she says. She is now married
again, but is scared to have
children because she doesn’t
want them to have to live
with the same disease. She
has managed to keep her
condition a secret from her
new in­laws, and says that
telling her husband about
the disease was one of her
most traumatic experien­
ces. However, her husband
is supportive and helps her
with the medicine.
HIV patients seek treatment in govern­
ment facilities, making constant access
to drugs one of the biggest factors. There
are currently 530 government ART cen­
tres and 1,000 link ART centres in the
country that supply medicine for free
to people living with HIV/AIDS. Such
centres provide easy access for patients
to get their medicine, but often suffer
from supply chain management issues—
resulting in many patients not receiving
their drugs on time. Pual Lhungdim, one
of the founders of DNP+, and himself an
AIDS survivor, is looking to fight this par­
ticular issue. “The nature of ART is such
that, if a patient misses even a few doses,
the risk of developing resistance to the
medicine is very high,” he says.
According to Lhungdim, there have
been several instances in the recent past
where the government failed to ensure a
constant supply of ART drugs. He rem­
embers an incident in 2013 when the
Delhi centres ran out of stock. “We had to
stage a protest for 11 days till the medicines
were made available,” he recalls. Gupta,
too, acknowledges this as a grave problem
in providing the required care. “There
have been instances where government
dispensaries have faced stock­outs. This
is because of the lack of coordination bet­
ween ART centres and stockers at about
20 per cent of the centres,” he says. He
adds that the government is looking to
address this problem through the instal­
lation of real­time monitoring systems
in every ART centre, but some problems
remain. “About 20 per cent of the centres
are still not linked to the live tracking
systems. We are trying to put in the infra­
structure but it takes time,” he says.
But what most patients are looking for
is a permanent fix. When Outlook spoke
to some of the people living with HIV, the
common query was: “When will there be
a cure?” The answer for that is far more
complicated, say scientists and research­
ers. AIDS is still a comparatively new
disease and has been around for only 35
years. “Even for diseases such as polio and
smallpox, it took more than a hundred
years to find a cure,” says a researcher.
The Delhi­based International AIDS Vac­
cine Initiative (IAVI) works specifically
on developing a cure for the disease, along
with finding a way to immunise people
against it. A recent international study
by IAVI titled ‘Protocol G’ found that cer­
tain people in high­risk populations, who
were exposed to HIV, seemed immune to
the virus. The study found that this was
because they possessed antibodies which
could resist the virus naturally. “This
means that we can hone such antibodies
and use them to develop immunisation
ART centres still
face supply issues.
When Delhi centres
ran out of stock in
2013, it took an
11-day protest for
the drugs to be
made available.
Kapil, 25,
a motor mechanic, has
already seen a lot in life. He
was diagnosed with HIV after
his newborn child died of
the disease at the age of two
months. This was after his
wife had already had two mis­
carriages—probably because
of the disease. Both husband
and wife were tested in the
hospital after their child
passed away, and it was found
that both were HIV­positive.
Kapil had to tell his parents
and family about the disease,
but they have disowned him.
He does not know how he
contracted the disease and is
fighting it all alone.
(All names changed)
that could work on a broader spectrum
for people,” says a representative of IAVI,
adding that the research has taken us a
step closer to developing a vaccine for
HIV in the near future.
A complete cure, though, still seems a
distant prospect, as the AIDS virus is ext­
remely robust and attacks the body by
destroying already present antibodies,
while creating antibodies of its own. “In
the pursuit for an HIV vaccine, research­
ers have been able to identify broadly
neutralising antibodies that are effective
against a wide range of HIV strains. This
development has sparked off the search
for similar antibodies in other disease
areas, in addition to ongoing research
efforts to design antibody­based prod­
ucts that are affordable, effective and
user­friendly,” says Dr Rajat Goyal, the
country director of IAVI. Even if no cure
can be expected soon, prevention is pos­
sible. But above all, awareness is the key.
We just have to stop blaming the patient
for contracting HIV/AIDS. O
30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 59
 NET PLAY

‘World No. 1 no big deal, only performance matters’

GETTY IMAGES

Passing Shot At The

by Qaiser Mohammad Ali

F
OUR years ago, Srikanth Nammal-
war Kidambi was in the ICU of a
Hyderabad hospital when he col-
lapsed in the bathroom after a
strenuous training session. At the
end of that dreaded July in 2014,
when he was diagnosed with meningitis,
he was ranked world No. 29. Today he is
the world’s No. 1 badminton player.
Could anything at all have foretold this
total inversion of fate? Yes, Srikanth’s
incredible work ethic and willingness
to push himself to the very limits. If
rankings could tell tales, Srikanth’s
would speak of unrelieved toil.
At the just-concluded Commonwealth
Games (CWG) in Gold Coast, 25-year-old
Srikanth played a key role in providing
India a confident platform by helping it
win the mixed team gold. Later, the top
seed reached the singles final too. He lost
Srikanth climbs atop the badminton heap. True grit bears fruit.
to Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia (world No. 1
from 2008-12), but not before wresting
the first game. Between the two events,
the Badminton World Federation (BWF)
announced their latest rankings, charting
Srikanth’s climb to the summit, replacing
Denmark’s Viktor Axelsen. It was three
years since Saina Nehwal had reached the
pinnacle in the women’s category in April
2015. Currently, P.V. Sindhu is ranked No.
3 and Saina, who was laid low by a knee
injury last year, is 12th.
Thanks to the six medals, including
two golds the shuttlers won, India fin-
ished a creditable third in the CWG
medal standings with 66 medals—26
gold, 20 silver and 20 bronze, behind
hosts Australia (80 gold) and England
(45 gold). It was a shade better than the
2014 CWG in Glasgow, where it had won
64 medals, including 15 gold.
Though India has dominated some
team sports like cricket and hockey,
there have been only a few instances
when Indians have reached the peak,
with consistent world-class perfor-
mances in individual competitions. The
exceptions are chess wizard Viswana-

60 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

 After helping India win the mixed team
badminton gold and wining individual silver
at the Commonwealth Games, world No. 1
Kidambi Srikanth has tougher challenges
ahead this year. He spoke to Qaiser
Mohammad Ali on a variety of issues in
an exclusive interview. Excerpts:
Has the feeling of becoming world No. 1
sunk in?
I am definitely happy. But world No. 1 is not
a big deal. I’m not really thinking too much
about the ranking. For me, it’s more about
performance.
What does the world No. 1 ranking mean to
you?
I really want to go deep into every tourna-
ment, reach semi-finals or finals, or maybe
win them, consistently play at my best and
give my 100 per cent.
What happened in the singles final against
Lee Chong Wei? You won the first game 21-
19, but from the second game the match
changed and Chong won 21-14, 21-14.
I made a few simple mistakes and I gave a
few easy points, something which I had
avoided against him in the mixed team final.
I should have avoided those. He played with
a lot of maturity. Of course, he had the
experience to pull things back.
But were you focused in the second game?
I don’t know. I did not feel the difference. I
was focused throughout.
Chong Wei, at 35, is 10 years older to you.
Summit
Doggedness will keep him there.
than Anand; ace shuttlers Prakash
Padukone and Saina; Leander Paes and
Mahesh Bhupathi in doubles and Sania
Mirza (with Martina Hingis) in wom-
en’s doubles tennis; archer Deepika
Kumari; and shooters Jitu Rai, Ronjan
Singh Sodhi and Heena Sidhu.
Indian women, like Saina, who won
the CWG gold beating the 2016 Olympic
silver medallist Sindhu, have been per-
forming consistently. And there are
now three Indians in the top 15 ranking
chart in men’s badminton. Besides
leader Srikanth, Prannoy H.S. is at 11th
But he surprised all by his sudden aggres-
sion from the second game onwards. Were
you surprised?
He definitely started to play really well
[from the second game]. But if you are play-
ing against someone with that much experi-
ence, you have to be ready for everything.
Sometimes, things change suddenly. It is
important to learn from your mistakes and
come back stronger.
But were you ready for what Chong Wei
presented in the second and the third
games?
Definitely, yes. You’ve to be ready, but
things do change suddenly. You’ve got to be
ready because that’s the only way to tackle
it. Everyone will have his own strategies,
and whoever plays better will win. That day,
he played a little better than me and won.
You’ve not beaten Chong Wei in ranking
tournaments in four meetings. Does the
head-to-head history come into play when
you face a rival?
It might be there but once you get on to the
court it is a new day, a new match—who-
ever plays well will win. There might be
things people talk about. But when you go
out it’s the 60 or 70 minutes of badminton
that you play that matters.
So, what is your plan now?
I don’t have too much time to rest. I am
leaving this Saturday [April 21] for the Asia
Championships [April 24-29, in Wuhan,
China] and then the Thomas Cup
[May 20-27].
and Sai Praneeth B. at the 15th position.
Last November, Srikanth had become
world No. 2, inching further up from the
No. 4 spot. His climb to the No. 1 spot on
April 12 was achieved on the foundation
of some fine achievements last year,
when he won four major titles—the
most by any player in 2017. In the recent
past, only Chong Wei has done better—
winning five titles each in 2015 and 2016.
“This is very special. Indian badminton
has a good history and some players
The All England, World
Championships, Asiad
and Olympics crowns
still elude Srikanth. Plus,
he has to be motivated
and fight monotony.
What is your next big target? Two of the
big events this year are the World
Championships and the Asian Games, nei-
ther of which you have won yet.
There’s a lot of time left for the World
Championships [July 30-Aug 5] and the
Asian Games [Aug 18-Sept 2]. I’m playing
many tournaments before those two
events. I’m focused on doing well in the
next few tournaments. I definitely want to
do well in those two big tournaments, but
am not directly thinking about them.
Professional badminton players travel con-
stantly around the world for tournaments.
Are you comfortable with your schedule for
this year?
This year has become tougher, the schedule
tighter. There is not much time to sit back
and relax. I want to focus on each event and
don’t want to play too many Grand Prix Gold
events. I want to do well in the SuperSeries
events, and then tournaments like the
World Championships, the CWG and the
Asian Games. I want to pick and choose to
keep my body fit for the big events. I really
don’t want to play too many big tourna-
ments before a big event end up with an
injury or something.
When would you start preparation for the
2020 Tokyo Olympic Games?
I want to think about it after I qualify for
that tournament. It is about two years from
now, so it is a long time away. O
Read the full text of the interview
www.outlookindia.com
have gone on to the top level, right from
the 1950s. Nandu Natekar and Dinesh
Khanna, and then Prakash Padukone
won the All England in 1981. But in the
last 10 years, many good players have
come along. Saina became No. 1, Jwala
Gutta and Ashwani Ponappa, Prannoy
H.S., Satwiksairaj Rankireddy, and
Chirag Chandrashekhar Shetty—all are
playing at the highest level [with dis-
tinction],” former national champion U.
Vimal Kumar tells Outlook.
However, no one beats Srikanth in
single-minded devotion and hard work.
Slightly built, he is a naturally gifted
player. The right-hander has a rich vari-
ety of strokes, including a powerful
smash—often delivered from the back of
the court, and containing a dizzying
variety of guile and craftiness itself—and
deceives his opponents with clever
manoeuverings. He is one of the most
attacking players in the world, and
30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 61
 NET PLAY

prowls the court with lightning speed. Asian Games. He would be desperately [both in 2015]. This year, Srikanth can
His net play, too, is mesmerising. Earlier, keen to add these to his silverware to be look at winning the Asian Games and the
when he used to falter while attacking, regarded as one of the greats. His best at World Championships, which is a good
cracks would appear in his game. Now the Olympics was reaching the quar- possibility. I feel he has a good chance
he plays long rallies and keeps the shut- ter-finals in 2016 in Rio. Srikanth him- there. If he wins those big ones, he can
tle in play when the going is tough. self realises that he has to overcome become one of the all-time greats,” says
That’s a giant leap in tactical range. these last hurdles standing before him Vimal Kumar.
in his remarkable journey. “I am very Arvind Bhat, a two-time national sin-

S
RIKANTH’S journey to the top of a happy to become world No. 1, but I want gles champion, says Srikanth will have
world sport has its origins in obscu- to be more consistent and perform well to make sacrifices to achieve his dream.
rity, and his path was strewn with in every tournament I play,” Srikanth “He would need perseverance. He’ll have
heavy odds. Born to a farmer father, told Outlook from Gold Coast. to keep his mind and body fresh. He’ll
K.V.S. Krishna and homemaker Radha have to work on his weaknesses to go on
in Ravulapalem, Andhra Pradesh, and win the titles that have eluded him
Srikanth’s elder brother Nanda Gopal so far, like the World Championships.
was a doubles player. Srikanth also began But I see him winning these titles by
as a doubles player, before shifting his 2020,” predicts Bhat optimistically.
focus onto singles. After becoming No. 1, Srikanth has
Soon, Srikanth caught the eye of former raised expectations, besides inspiring
All England champion Pullela Gopichand, youngsters to take to badminton. Along
the great coach who runs his celebrated with that there would be more distrac-
academy in Hyderabad, the nursery of tions—a torrent of adulation, with people
India’s world-class shuttlers. Srikanth vying for a piece of him. So, he will have to
joined up in 2009. Renowned coach be more fiercely focused and work harder
Bhaskar Babu distinctly remembers the than before to remain ahead of his rivals.
time he met Srikanth in 2010-11, when he Arif warns him of the crucial factor of
was conducting a national camp for core monotony. “A good player continuously
group players in Hyderabad. “I used to keeps working and improving on any one
take his services, especially for sparring aspect of his game, physically. On the
with Saina Nehwal, the only player of PTI
technical side, since your opponents
world standard at the time. Srikanth had know your game as all matches are video-
a good attack and used to play a lot of “Strategically, Srikanth is recorded, you must have a weapon to
rallies. All that was very useful for Saina; surprise them. And there comes a time
her sparring with Srikanth particularly very good and so is his when monotony creeps in and that leads
improved her defence,” recalls Babu. net game. The backhand to downfall. He’ll have to guard against
Gopichand’s coach Syed Mohammed that,” says the Hyderabad-based coach.
Arif, too, has followed Srikanth’s career cross-court smash is Srikanth is determined and has rem-
closely. “In the last few years, he has arkable will-power in the face of chal-
beaten almost all top players. Speed is
deadly,” says coach Syed lenges, as he has exhibited. After he was
his biggest asset and he is very agile on Mohammed Arif. laid low by meningitis in 2014, he not
his legs; his movements are brisk. only recovered from the illness in a
Strategically, he’s very good and so is his couple of weeks, but within four
net game. The backhand cross-court The first, big obstacle course before months did the unthinkable. He
smash against his right-handed oppo- Srikanth is the World Championships, to stunned China’s redoubtable Lin
nent is deadly,” points out the be held in July-August in Nanjing, China. Dan—a two-time Olympic champion,
Dronacharya Awardee coach. The All England is almost a year away and five-time world champion, and six-
The way Srikanth beat Chong Wei, the Olympics beckons in the distance: time All England winner—in the final of
currently world No. 7, in the CWG mixed 2020. But he will have a crack at the Asian China Open SuperSeries Premier to
team final—with consummate ease— Games in August-September in Jakarta become the first Indian to clinch the
was an achievement, as he was yet to and Palembang, Indonesia, where he will men’s title. “The illness changed me. I
beat the Malaysian in their four meet- face a tough challenge from the Chinese became more passionate than ever. I
ings in ranking tournaments. His 21-17, and Japanese shuttlers as well. For that, started training a lot harder,” Srikanth
21-14 win over Chong on April 9 will Srikanth will have to remain fit, maintain had said then. More than any time in
hopefully give Srikanth a mental edge form and remain fiercely focused. “When his career, his millions of fans would
over him in future encounters. you have a few of the big events, like All like to see the same kind of results from
Interestingly, Srikanth has become England and World Championships him. Improving his own track record
world No. 1 without winning the World under your belt, you will have a lot more and drawing amply from Gopichand’s
Championships—and the farthest he satisfaction. Even Saina got to world No. unparalleled technical nous, it will be
has reached is the quarter-finals of the 1, and then lost in the final of the All tough to dislodge Srikanth from his
All England, the Olympic Games and the England and World Championships new-found perch. O

62 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

 Shri Jayakumar rawal
Parikrama around river Burai to
reSolve water criSiS in maharaShtra
INR 20 crores development funds for Burai river in
shindhkheda taluka says “Minister Shri Jayakumar Rawal”
S
hri Jayakumar Rawal, Hon’ble
Tourism Minister of
Maharashtra’s proposal for
constructing thirty-three dams
across river Burai to keep it flowing all-
round the year has been sanctioned at an
estimated cost of INR 20 crores. Shri Rawal
to complete the Parikrama of the river
which commenced on 11th April is a
five-day activity and aims to eliminate
drinking water shortage. In the entire 54
kilometre stretch along the river 34
interconnected dams will be constructed
in which water will be accumulated
resulting in constant flow of water
throughout the year.
The foundation of the first dam among
the 34 dams was held on Wednesday,
11th April in Dusane village, Sakri district.
During the Parikrama, Shri Rawal will talk
to the inhabitants of villages of Balsane,
Satmane, Rewadi, Devi, Shevade, Amrale,
Gangeshwar temple, Chimthane,
Nishane, Mhalpur, Babhulde, Dakhede,A
alne,Chirne,kadane, Parsamal, Kumrej,
Shindhkheda, Patan, Sulvade and Varsus
followed by a gathering on 15th April at
Gandhi Chowk in Shindhkheda. The flow
of the Burai river was affected due to
moderate rainfall last year which resulted
in the construction of the dams.
The inauguration ceremony was
conducted in the presence of renowned
social workers Shri Chitram Powar ,
Narendra Girase, Sanjeevani Sisode,
Chandrakala Sisode, Nitin Gawande from
Shirpur village, Ganesh Missal from Dhulia
village , Sandeep Bhosle Sakri Tehsildar,
Sudam Mahajan Shindhkheda Tehsildar,
Rohidas Varude Apar tehsildar, Agricultural
Officer Chandra Shekhar Sathe,
Police Superintendent M Ramkumar,
Dhulia sub divisional police officer Sachin
hire and other villagers along with BJP
volunteers.
The state government has given
priority to the development of drought
prone areas. Minister Rawal said at this
time that he is now working similarly,
around 6,000 acres of area which will be
covered under irrigation. This will help in
improving the livelihood of the farmers.
CHOUHAN BANKING ON PERFOR
Keen on leading his party to a fourth consecutive term, the Madhya Pradesh Chief
Minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, is relying on his stellar performance.

By Rajesh Sirothia from Bhopal

O
ver the next almost two
years, Madhya Pradesh will
be immersed in poll fever.
The chief minister Shivraj
Singh Chouhan is bracing
to perform a hat-trick of victory under his
leadership and wants to win the credit for
BJP’s fourth win in a row. The state will go
to assembly elections in November this year
and political activities in both the BJP and
the Congress have started hotting up. The
electoral contest is bound to an interesting
one. The Congress is convinced that in
the absence of a third force, it alone is in
a position to get advantage of the anti-
incumbency against the ruling BJP. Reason:
The state’s politics has been bipolar for the
past at least 25 years. The BJP knows that
things are not easy for it and it has already
prepared a game plan for victory and is
implementing it in right earnest.
The fact is that the November elections
will be the biggest test of Chouhan’s political
career. He will have to battle against a
mountain of odds. Of the 15-year rule of the
BJP in the state, Chouhan has been at the
helm for 13. Clearly, he will have to contend
with the anti-incumbency factor. Moreover,
due to the Modi Government’s economic
policies, the state government will have to
face double anti-incumbency. But if the BJP
is still hopeful of retaining Madhya Pradesh,
it is because the chief minister Chouhan
is far from being dejected. In fact, he is
brimming with self-confidence. He says,
“A long stint in the government is bound
to generate discontent on many fronts. department was abolished and instead, the pay commission scales. However, when
But I have my hands on the pulse of the urban civic bodies and district panchayats that was done, the Adhyapaks discovered
people. I never behaved like a ruler. As the were asked to recruit Shiksha Karmis that their take-home had shrunk and
chief minister, I always considered myself a (teacher workers) to man the government moreover, deductions started being made
servant of the people. I have complete faith schools. After coming to power, the BJP from their salaries. In view of the growing
in the people of the state”. government ended the “Karmi culture” anger among the Adhyapaks, Chouhan
As for the reality of Chouhan’s claims, and gave the Shiksha Karmis the status of not only got the anomalies in the sixth pay
looking at the popular mood, he has taken Adhyapaks. A respectable enhancement commission scales removed but decided
a string of populist decisions. Among the was also made in their remuneration. But to revive the cadre of school teachers -
government servants, the two lakh-odd despite its promise of equal-pay-for-equal disbanded during the Digvijay rule - and
Adhyapaks were the most discontented. work, the BJP government could not fill merge the services of the Adhyapaks
During the regime of Digvijay Singh, the the chasm between the regular teachers and with it. Shivraj knows very well that the
cadre of teachers in the school education the Adhyapaks. During the run-up to the personnel manning the lower posts in the
last elections, they were promised the sixth government machinery play a key role

MANCE TO WIN A FOURTH TERM
in the election process and can make or
mar the chances of a political party. Not
only Adhyapaks, he also tried to fulfil the
demands of the poorly-paid Aaganwadi
workers, Patwaris and the field staff of the
health department working in the rural
areas. Anger against the government was
brewing among the farmers and those
associated with the farm section in the
state. The Shivraj Government took more
than two dozen pro-farmer decisions to
douse their anger, besides holding farmers’
conventions in all districts to make sure
that the decisions were implemented at the
ground level.
CONGREss CAUGHT UP
IN dIFFICUlTIEs
A
dept in the art of scoring self
goals, the moves the Congress
party makes over the next few
months may prove decisive for it.
Despite conditions being unfavourable
for the BJP, the Congress is not confident
of its victory. And the key reason is that
it is a house divided against itself. Its
satraps cannot reach to a consensus on
any issue. The Congress is neither able to
present itself as an alternative to the BJP
nor is it telling the people how and why
it would provide a better government
than the BJP and, if voted to power,
how it would make the life of the people
better.
The fact is that the smell of victory
has triggered an internal battle in
the Congress on who would head its
government. It is hardly focussing on
evolving a winning strategy for the polls.
One faction of the party insists that
if the party intends to win the polls, it
will have to pit a face against Shivraj.
Jyotiraditya Scindia’s is undoubtedly the
brightest and the most attractive face
in the Congress – a face that may draw
youths into the party’s camp. Scindia
has himself clearly said that it would
be unwise to enter the electoral arena
without projecting a chief ministerial
candidate. There is merit in his argument
because of late, the people of the country
not only chose their governments but
There is little doubt that farmers are in
dire straits in the state. The government
has been unable to come up to the
expectations of the agrarian community
– even more so because it expected that
with ‘Kisan Putra’ Shivraj at its helm,
the BJP Government would take steps
to end its distress. Obviously, higher the
expectations; more the discontent. Shivraj
knows this pretty well. He wants that when
the farmers set out to vote, they should be
convinced that the BJP would serve their
interests better than the Congress. Besides
farmers, the chief minister has also taken
a string of decisions in the interest of the
before casting their
vote, they want to
know who the next
Prime Minister of
chief minister would
be. Scindia knows that
if he is not projected
as the chief minister,
even if the party wins,
the powerful leaders
of the party would
not allow him to
head the government.
His biggest rival
is Digvijay Singh.
After completing his
Narmada Parikrama,
he has tried to throw a
wet blanket on the aspirations of Scindia
by saying that if Kamal Nath is projected
as the chief minister, he would work for
the party’s victory. He has also hinted
that he would like to lead the party’s poll
effort in the state on the condition that
he would not become the chief minister.
However, those who understand
Diggi Raja’s politics know very well
that whether the elections are fought
under the leadership of Kamal Nath or
anyone else, it will be Diggi who will
be the next chief minister. They know
that even though Kamal Nath has been
representing Chinndwara in the Lok
Sabha since 1980 (barring a three-year
Focus
workers in the unorganised sectors. The
government is getting them registered and
is making arrangements for direct transfer
of benefits into their bank accounts. To win
over the youth and the students, the Shivraj
Government has come out with a bouquet
of special schemes and programmes.
Even before he became the chief minister,
Chouhan was sensitive to the needs of the
girls and the women. After taking over the
reins of the government, he has ensured
that his concern for them gets translated
into schemes for their wellbeing. To sum
up, Shivraj and his government wants to
project its human face to garner votes.
gap) and has served as a union minister,
the people would not accept him as the
chief minister. As for Scindia, Diggi
would not allow him to assume the top
post under any circumstances.
It may be
mentioned here
that despite his
best efforts and his
steamroller majority
of 416 MPs, Rajiv
Gandhi could not
succeed in installing
Madhavarao Scindia
as the chief minister
in place of Arjun
Singh and had to
settle for Motilal Vora
as the compromise
candidate. Clearly,
it would be futile to
expect Rahul Gandhi
to succeed where
Rajiv Gandhi could
not. Ajay Singh, the leader of opposition
and son of Arjun Singh, and state
Congress President Arun Yadav have
been trying to weaken Scindia’s claim
by repeatedly asserting that projecting
a chief ministerial face is against the
tradition of the Congress. The party
high command is in acute dilemma.
Meanwhile, Deepak Bavaria, appointed
as the in-charge of the state elections by
the top leadership, has himself become a
problem. If thing continue like this, the
Congress’s dilemma may become the
people’s dilemma and that would make
the rather difficult path to victory, much
easier for the BJP.
 HIT MOVES

Tiger Tiger,
by Giridhar Jha outstanding cash counter figures
of a movie that starred a rela-

S
OMEONE keeping a tab tively new actor. We normally
on mainstream Hindi expect such a humongous figure
cinema in the early nine­ only from the big-budget movies
ties may recall how Sub­ of a megastar such as Salman

Burning
hash Ghai, Bollywood’s Khan who has had a loyal fan-fol-
erstwhile showman and lowing over the years.”
hitmaker, had ‘signed’ actor Mohan, the editor of trade
Jackie Shroff’s then toddler son journal Complete Cinema, says
for one of his future ventures. considering the fact that Baaghi

Bronze
At that time, he is learnt to have 2 had carried excellent pre-rel-
famously announced that in ease reports and that its prequel
the years to come, he would also turned out to be a decent hit,
launch Tiger Shroff as the lead­ it was expected to do a business
ing man just the way he had int­ of Rs 10-12 crore on the first day,
roduced his father in Hero but it surpassed all expectations
(1983). Given Ghai’s standing at by grossing Rs 25 crore. “Tiger
the time, the announcement Tiger Shroff breaks the Box has certainly proved all of us
was almost like stardom insur­ Office as a ‘dance­action’ star wrong with his box-office pull
ance for Jackie’s kid. after the below-par performance
With time though, Ghai lost his of his last two outings, The Flying
Midas touch. By the time Tiger came of throughout the movie. This phenome- Jatt (2016) and Munna Michael (2017)” .
age, Ghai was well past his prime. But a non has eluded other contemporary According to Mohan, this once again
younger filmmaker stepped in. It was actors, with the notable exception of the underlines the fact that a well-made
Sajid Nadiadwala who launched Tiger Khan triumvirate, in recent years. masala movie can never go out of fash-
five years back with Heropanti. The success of Baaghi 2 has left both ion. “If an action menu is served with
Still, going by the phenomenal success film industry insiders and trade experts the right ingredients, the audiences will
of Tiger’s recent film, which saw the awestruck, what with a collection of flock to the theatres to savour its taste,”
28-year-old actor emerge as a box-office more than Rs 25 crore on the very first he says. “A well-made action movie is
powerhouse, Ghai can be credited for day of its release on March 30—an what attracts the audiences, regardless
being clairvoyant enough to foresee a achievement only the Khans (and, of of prevailing trends.”
bright future for Jackie’s son long before course, Baahubali) have been able to Tiger’s action movies have always seen
he finally faced the arc-lights. boast of in the past decade or so. “The success. “Heropanti, Baaghi and, now,
Today, Tiger is being hailed as India’s collections of Baaghi 2 have been abso- Baaghi 2 have turned out to be the hits
answer to Tony Jaa (the Thai action lutely incredible so far, to say the least,” only because of his action sequences. On
star) by none other than Akshay Kumar. says veteran trade expert Atul Mohan. the contrary, The Flying Jatt and Munna
Other big stars such as Hrithik Roshan “We were all initially flummoxed by the Michael had dismal runs because they
are already singing hosannas to the did not contain enough maar-dhaad
young actor’s prowess. All this has come sequences to keep Tiger’s fans on the
about in the wake of Tiger’s fifth film— edge of their seats.”
Baaghi 2—a sequel to his 2016 hit Baaghi. Many believe that Tiger’s ability to
Directed by Ahmed Khan, the film—an connect with young audiences, espe-
unadulterated action masala entertainer cially kids and teenagers, has consoli-
in a strictly Bollywood sense—has regis- dated his fan base. “Like Salman, he
tered mindboggling footfalls in theatres appears to have endeared himself to his
across the country since it released last loyal admirers,” Mohan contends.
month. The movie has since crossed the Baaghi 2 has already done double the
Rs 150 crore milestone in the domestic business of its prequel in just two weeks
circuit alone, putting the success of and is therefore being seen in the indus-
Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s controversial, try as a veritable catalyst for the revival
much-hyped Padmaavat in the shade. Subhash Ghai famously of action movies—a genre that seemed
Even though many critics do not find
Tiger’s histrionics worth writing home
announced in the nineties to be on the wane in the era of millenni-
als. In recent years, only a few action
about, the young actor has amassed a that, in the future, he movies, such as Tiger Zinda Hai (2017),
solid fan-following among the younger have actually passed muster with
generation of cine-goers, especially would launch Tiger just younger audiences who are now exposed
teenagers. Theatres across cities report the way he had launched
youngsters whistling wildly and cheer- RIPPED REPERTOIRE Tiger in a
ing lustily the new six-packed sensation his father in Hero (above). still from the superhit Baaghi 2

66 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

 H I T M OVES

SENIOR ROAR Salman Khan cackles

a machine gun in Tiger Zinda Hai

to high-quality, CGI-boosted action

extravaganzas from Hollywood and
other parts of the world. Even stars like
Akshay Kumar and Ajay Devgn, who
were once known as dependable action
heroes, have switched over to con-
tent-heavy social dramas these days
while Sunny Deol, who made a fortune
with his legendary dhaai kilo ke haath, is
well past his prime. It is only Salman
Khan, who can still deliver an occasional
action thriller. But then, at 52, he too is
no spring chicken, with the quick cuts
and slo-mos unable to hide the slowing
reflexes in fight scenes.

B
OLLYWOOD, in fact, desperately
needed a fresh action star, and Tiger
has arrived at the right time to fill
the slot. “The audience did not go to
theatres looking for a story in Baaghi 2,
they just went to see Tiger pull off amaz-
ing stunts and nothing else,” says film
writer Vinod Anupam. “He truly
emerged as an action hero with this film.”
The national award-winning writer
says Tiger created his own distinct
identity with high-on-testosterone
stunt sequences over time. “Unlike
some of the other star kids, Tiger does
not carry the baggage of being a
high-profile star kid. He has evolved on
his own, quietly making his own fans
who don’t care about his pedigree,” he
says. “His arrival is a bonanza for action
movie lovers. When his fans go to see his
movie, they don’t expect him to be a
replica of his father.”
That appears to be true. Many star kids,
howsoever talented, failed to make it
over the years because they failed to
unburden themselves from the heft of
huge expectations that the audiences
had from them because of their pedigree.
In contrast, Tiger could grow out of the
looming shadow of his father’s stardom
effortlessly, thanks to his abilities to
create an altogether different image of
himself, primarily aided by his skills in
dance and action sequences—his father,
despite his macho image, was always
slightly awkward of body.
Industry observers believe that
Baaghi 2’s success has once again emp-
hasised the fact that there is always an
audience for all the different genres of
Hindi cinema. “They (audiences) are
watching Newton, Bahubali and Baaghi
2, all at the same time,” says Anupam.
Film distributor Sanjay Sharma, on
the other hand, says that Tiger has
donned the mantle of a ‘dancing-action’
star, a title no other actor has inherited
since the fading of Mithun Chakraborty
from the scene. “The last time I wit-
nessed such craze in a theatre for a
dancing-action star was when Mithun
was in his prime with movies like Disco
Dancer (1982),” says Sharma. “Until
Tiger came along, no star could emulate
Mithun’s feat in the past 25 years when
Bollywood’s mushy musical romances
“The last time I witnessed
such craze in a theatre for
a dancing-action star was
when Mithun was in his
prime,” says distributor
Sanjay Sharma.
and realistic cinema had relegated the
action flicks to the backseat.”
Sharma points out that no actor can
currently match Tiger in action or dance
scenes. “Hrithik is undoubtedly a ter-
rific dancer, but he cannot do action like
Tiger,” he says. “Similarly, Ranbir
Kapoor or Ranveer Singh are far better
actors than him but they cannot do
stunts the way Tiger does. That auto-
matically puts him in an altogether dif-
ferent position.”
Baaghi 2 had not received positive
reviews from critics after its release,
unlike Blackmail, which carried exce-
llence reports. And yet, the Irrfan-star-
rer dark comedy could collect only
Rs 2.5 crore on the first day at the box off-
ice, a tenth of what Tiger’s movie collec-
ted. In fact, such has been the impact of
the film’s commercial success that prod-
ucers are more than eager to get Tiger to
sign on the dotted line, mostly for
action-oriented movies. Not only this, if
the industry grapevine is to be believed,
even the script of his next release, Karan
Johar’s Student of the Year 2, believed to
be a triangular love story starring Tiger
opposite newbies Ananya Pandey and
Tara Sutaria, is being tweaked to make
the most of his new-found popularity as
an action star. Whether this is true or
not is immaterial, but it makes sharp
business sense, given the craze among
Tiger’s action-loving admirers. Bottom
line: Tiger definitely packs a punch at
the box office! O

68 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

theatre Shikhandi [
* *
Starring: Meher Acharia-Dar, Mahnaz Damania, Vikrant Dhote, Karan Desai, Nikhil Murali, Srishti Srivastava. Writer-Director: Faezeh Jalali
In Between Epic And Eternity
T
HOSE familiar with the Mahabha­
rata in any of its forms will know
that there are no easy answers to the
questions raised by the multitude of
characters in the innumerable sub­
plots mapping the epic. A swarm of
ideas is also in battle at Kurukshetra.
One character through whom the epic raises
difficult questions around gender is Shikha­
ndi, a girl born to King Drupad (father of
Draupadi too), who raises her as a boy, tea­
ches her martial skills, even gets her married
to another girl. Shikhandi grows up feeling
traumatised and confused and even tries to
kill herself for not having a penis. She then
gets ‘manhood’ on loan from a Yaksha. How­
ever, on the battlefield—by which time she is
both a man and a woman or neither—she
confronts the invincible Bhishma, who drops
his weapon as he won’t fight a woman. That
changes the course of the war.
But that story is from thousands of years
ago. Here in Mumbai, at the Experimental
Theatre of NCPA, when Faezeh Jalali pre­
sents Shikhandi: The story of In-Betweens—
written and directed by her and researched
and mulled over for almost a decade (she first
created it as a 20­minute, one­woman show
in Berlin)—the story becomes a brisk, pinch­
ing satire about punishing times, then and
now. The play, produced by Jalali’s company
FATS The Arts and NCPA, is back in Mumbai
after travelling to different Indian cities.
The 90­minute, no­intermission play starts
on a high note and takes the audience on a
fast­paced ride, starting with the battle scene
of the Mahabharata. Jalali ambitiously
blends Koodiyattam, Kalaripayattu, Yaksha­
gana, aerial rope skills and English verse to
create a modern retelling of the myth of
Jalali blends Shikhandi, while still keeping it rooted. The
Koodiyattam, actors don’t let her down—their energy and
timing for dance, dialogues and diction in
Kalaripayattu, Marathi, Hindi and English lift the play sev­
Yakshagana, eral notches higher. Concepts of gender and
aerial rope sexuality are discussed and stereotypes
skills and shredded at every juncture, giving LGBTQ
English verse issues a strikingly ancient context.
Complicated sub­plots and back stories are
to recreate explained rapidly in flashbacks and fast
the myth of movements, continuously interjected with a
Shikhandi. modern, liberal take. The story of Shikhandi’s
**** Must See *** Good ** Average * Avoidable
* * ] LANGAUGES: MARATHI, ENGLISH, HINDI
past life is a vivid example. Amba (Shikhandi
in her past life) is kidnapped by Bhishma
along with her sisters to be married to his
brother. Amba has a lover and refuses to
marry, begging Bhishma to let her go. But she
is rejected by her lover, because she has been
touched by another man—Bhishma. She
can’t get married to Bhishma either, because
he has vowed celibacy. Even as she weeps,
there’s a quick aside about whether marriage
is the only goal for a woman. The scenes with
Lord Shiva, as he descends from the ceiling,
are entertaining and effective. Draupadi too
has a delicious part—a feisty girl who would
do anything to get rid of dance classes and
fights boys who bully Shikhandi.
For the team, after getting a teacher to
teach Koodiyattam to the cast and travelling
to Udipi to learn Yakshagana and rehearsing
for several months, there were challenges
galore. “You don’t get space to rehearse at the
performance venue. So we realised that we
need to move faster in smaller spaces.
Knowing timing and the rhythm in the space
where we are rehearsing as opposed to where
we are performing is a challenge. Luckily at
the NCPA, we got to do tech rehearsals and
we also got five show runs, which was great,”
says Jalali, who recently won a META award
for supporting acting in the play I don’t like it
as you like it. “Also, because it is such an
intensely physical form, there are worries
about injuries and the fitness of actors. But
one remembers the ups.”
The strength of the play is in posing logical
questions as if there was no baggage of
mythology and religion attached to it, but
without ridiculing or over­simplifying and
glossing over details. This play is very diff­
erent from the soul­stirring, existential quest
of Peter Brooks’ Mahabharata (a 1985 land­
mark play to which a comparison for any play
in this domain is inevitable), but it stresses
more on the natural rights of human beings
to be what they are and how the assertion
comes in direct conflict with societal rules; a
more relevant telling of the tale for our times.
Not to mention the potential of the Maha­
bharata in drawing writers and directors to
explore, unravel and discover the complexi­
ties of human life for a long time to come. O
Prachi Pinglay-Plumber
30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 69
 books Syeda Hameed
Born to be Hanged: Political Biography of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto | Rupa Publications | xxi + 264 pages | Rs 500
His Flaws Were Borrowed
Bhutto’s character traits, his late political life as PM, his controversial death...all that is brillianty lit in
by Vivek Katju
I
N the introduction of her book,
Syeda Hameed writes, “For twenty
years I lived with a man I never
met”. She repeats almost the same
sentence while finally summaris­
ing her assessment of Zulfikar Ali
Bhutto: “An extraordinary man who I
never met, but with whom I have lived
for almost twenty years”. Clearly,
Hameed has been awestruck by Bhu­
tto. She worked on his political biog­
raphy off and on for two decades;
hence, a full consideration of all fac­
ets of his complex political journey
could be legitimately expected. This
is sadly lacking, as is an examination
of some of Bhutto’s policies and act­
ions that particularly impacted India.
However, on offer are many int­
eresting aspects of Bhutto’s life and
career which make Hameed’s work
worth reading. What adds interest
are the questions raised, although
tangentially, on the criterion to judge
great political leaders.
Bhutto was the scion of a leading
Sindhi landed family. He inherited
many of its feudal traits—fondness for
the good life, supreme confidence, arro­
gance and disdain for opposing views.
But he also displayed qualities that went
beyond the confines of his class—intel­
lectual depth and vigour, powers of art­
iculation, an ability to identify with and
therefore mobilise and sway the masses.
Their impact was eroded though by a
suspicious nature and vicious vengeful­
ness. Thus, many contradictions com­
bined in his varied personality, which
took him to the pinnacle of power to give
hope to a defeated country but which
also plunged him from the execution
platform. Fascinated by the elements,
often at odds with themselves, in Bhutto
the man and politician, Hameed sees
‘parallels’ in his life and Sophocles’s
Oedipus. True, there was much drama in
70 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
Bhutto’s crowded, charged and short life,
but did the fault lie in him or in his stars?
Bhutto’s political career falls into four
distinct parts: his induction to the
Pakistan cabinet in 1958 when he was
only thirty, to the split with his benefac­
tor, Ayub Khan, in 1966; next came a
period of five years when he was incar­
cerated for some time, established the
Pakistan People’s Party and became
West Pakistan’s popular mass leader;
the third period saw Bhutto, after
Pakistan’s decisive defeat in December
1971, become Pakistan’s president and
later prime minister till, in July 1977, he
was overthrown in a military coup. The
last spell witnessed what Justice
Muneer told one of the convicting
Hamid selectively focuses
on Bhutto’s histrionics and
how they swayed people.
Ignored is his talks in ’63, as
foreign minister, with India,
on Kashmir—the only time
this has ever happened.
Supreme Court judges, “You have com­
mitted judicial murder”. Zia­ul­Haq
executed him in April 1979.
Hameed steers selectively through
these four periods. She focuses on
Bhutto’s evolution as a political leader
and the development of his “political
agenda based on Islamic faith, demo­
cratic polity, socialist economy and
confrontation with India”. Her interest
is on the ways he swept the masses of
West Pakistan through his histrionics
and oratory. While this is valuable in
gaining an understanding of Bhutto, it is
at the cost of ignoring his association
with some historically crucial events.
Almost his first assignment on becoming
foreign minister in 1963 was to hold
talks with Sardar Swaran Singh on
Jammu and Kashmir. This was the only
time when India and Pakistan engaged
in detailed discussions on the territorial
disposition of the state, but Hameed
omits any mention of this engagement.
Bhutto was one of the principal archi­
tects of Pakistan’s failed 1965 war
against India. Ironically, instead of
being held responsible, he emerged as “a
national hero”, partly because of his
dramatic interventions in the United
Nations as foreign minister. These acted
as a salve to the disappointments of the
Pakistani people, who were fed on a diet
of great martial superiority. However,
they had no impact on the national posi­
tions of member­states, who acted acc­
ording to their interests.
Bhutto broke away from Ayub Khan
for ‘ignoring’ Kashmir at Tashkent. His
popularity soared because of his incar­
ceration and his pro­poor and anti­India
stance. In 1969, Ayub Khan had to quit
and Gen Yahya Khan took over. He held
elections in 1970. The basic faultline of
Pakistan, between its East and West
wings, now became decisive. Sheikh
Mujibur Rahman’s Awami League was
in a position to form the federal govern­
ment. Bhutto went along with the army
to deny this. The army launched a geno­
cide in March 1971. Bhutto’s role thr­
ough this period, which witnessed the
break­up of Pakistan, is entirely dubious,
but Hameed ignores it.
Pakistan’s decisive defeat in 1971 wit­
nessed Bhutto’s finest moment. Hameed
gives a fascinating account of the beh­
ind­the­scene activity that led to Bhutto
becoming president after Dhaka had
fallen to the Indian army. Bhutto’s
speeches to the UNSC were once again
a balm to an enraged and disoriented
populace. Now, with the army discred­
ited, he was the supreme leader of the
country. He ruled Pakistan for almost
five years, till he was overthrown by his
own chosen army chief, Zia­ul­Haq, who
From The Epics
this biography, but it’s silent on his deleterious role in the 1971 crisis

was obsequious till he was subordinate

to Bhutto. His tragic end, which Hameed
focuses on admirably, should not pre­
vent an evaluation of the years of his
rule. Nor should his stoicism and refusal
to personally seek mercy when it bec­
ame increasingly clear that Zia, disrega­
rding mercy appeals from world leaders,
would execute him, prevent that.
As Hameed views Bhutto as a tragic
hero her emphasis is on how, when he
was at the pinnacle of his career, his flaws
and suspicions drove him to alienate and
often brutally humiliate his closest polit­
ical colleagues. She principally relies on
Mubashir Hasan, one of the founders of
the PPP and Bhutto’s finance minister till
he, like some others, resigned and left, to
relate the inner workings of the Bhutto
government. Hasan saw the process of
Bhutto relying more and more on the
intelligence agencies and the civilian
bureaucracy instead of colleagues. That
only insulates a leader from the people,
to his and the country’s detriment.

F
OR all this, Bhutto’s major contribu­
tion to his country was to give it
hope when it was in dark despair. He
had to regain Pakistan’s position in
the world. He focused on negotiating
with India and building ties with the
larger Islamic world. Hameed asserts,
“The Simla Pact was a great victory for
Pakistan”. She states that Pakistan ent­
ered the negotiations as a defeated
country and made no “vital concessions”
for the return of the POWs or territory.
This cannot be denied, but Bhutto’s
obsessive animosity towards and mis­
placed fear of India prevented him from
laying the foundations of peace and
cooperation with a larger neighbour. In
retrospect, this was not the act of a
far­seeing statesman.
Neither Bhutto’s contribution to the
development of Pakistan’s nuclear weap­
ons programme (which Hameed does
not cover) nor the triumph of gaining the
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in Dhaka, January 1971. They
held talks to resolve the deepening crisis in East Pakistan, which went nowhere.
sympathy of the Islamic world (which own army and, increasingly, extreme
Hameed emphasises through a long des­ religious groups; true democracy would
cription of the Second Islamic Summit, remain a distant dream.
held in Lahore in 1974) could transform In judging Bhutto, Hameed quotes
Pakistan as Bhutto wanted. Only true Hasan, “Try to understand the mind of a
peace with India could, which he sovereign, a man in whose name a state
shunned. Indeed, as a democrat, he did acts. Don’t judge his actions as ethical or
not realise that without peace with India, unethical. When you act for the state—
Pakistan would remain a prisoner of its you are the sovereign. There are no
ethics”. Earlier, she quotes Hasan on the
‘sovereign mind’ thus: “Moral consider­
Bhutto’s role in the Simla ations, personal and populist values
Agreement is undeniable, become secondary to the pursuit of
power and staying in power”. These
but his paranoia over India views pave the path to tyranny, megalo­
stopped him from laying mania and disaster. They cannot bring
the foundations of peace forth “the tallest political figure of Pak­
istan, perhaps of South Asia and Islamic
and left the door ajar for a world”. Hameed is simply wrong in so
discredited army. evaluating Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. O

30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 71

 glitterati

Force Beneath Those Moves

The woman below, shouldering the burden in this picture, is Namrata Purohit—nat­
ional­level squash player, footballer, certified scuba diver, author and now an entrepre­
neur who co­founded The Pilates Studio. If you marvel at Kareena and Malaika’s
flexibility in Bollywood dance numbers, it’s this lady who deserves much of the credit.

Scratch
’Em Now!
She won the country four medals,
including four precious gold, impress­
ing everyone with talent, poise, heart and
indomitable comebacks.... An athlete often
needs props to egg her on—the cheering audi­
ence, a personal keepsake. Manika Batra, our one
undisputed star from the CWG, painted her nails
tricoloured as she chopped and placed and
smashed at will. To call her
‘hypernationalist’ again
shows up the stench
from the garbage that
is social media.

Rapper Kendrick Lamar became the first artist to win the Pulitzer prize for music from a non-classical
or jazz background. The 30-year-old’s album, titled Damn, had already earned him rave reviews and five
THIS TOO Grammys. The album is very political and addresses issues like Black empowerment and Trump.
HAPPENED

72 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018

All Hands Aboard
When two acclaimed dir­ Role Model
ectors meet...one of them India has a tiny toehold
turns actor for the other. on the hair­raising espio­
Such is what happened nage activities and special
when Iranian auteur Majid ops in WWII that kept
Majidi asked Goutam Hollywood well­supplied
Ghose for a favour and rec­ for 80 years through Noor
eived ‘yea’ for an answer. Inayat Khan, the fearless
For Majidi’s Beyond The SOE operative in
Clouds, the script for which Occupied France who
demanded he gets a ‘hag­ tricked the Gestapo for
gard’ look, Ghose deprived years, before being bet­
himself of sleep ruthlessly, rayed and caught, later
while also losing weight. perishing in Dachau. The
PTI
Indian heroine is to be
played in a biopic by
Radhika Apte.
Hope she does
justice to
Noor.

GETTY IMAGES
Slurps From His Secret Potion
When you are making pots of money in China, it is expected of you to
humour them. For Aamir Khan, Dangal was only the start of a lucrative
friendship. Secret Superstar, which grossed Rs 63 crore in India, made a
mountainous Rs 800 crore across the Doklam plateau. Pleased as punch,
Aamir teamed up with actor Andy Lau in Hong Kong for a presser.

Memory Ke Peechhe
Rumours of their romantic goi­
ngs­on lie yellowing in old gossip
pages. But old tales never die, so
both Madhuri and Sanjay Dutt
were tarrying, in typically weird
Bollywood style, to admit that
they’re co­actors in a period drama
called Kalank. Great. Big deal!

PRABHAT SHETTY/HT/GETTY IMAGES

“I’ll assure you it’s a personal thing. Let’s just leave it at that.” Dire Straits
bassist JOHN ILLSLEY refers to lead singer/guitarist Mark Knopf ler, who did
not attend the band’s induction into the rock- n- roll hall of fame in Cleveland.

30 April 2018 OUTLOOK 73


Much Water Has Flown
We mark the anniversaries of people, even
institutions, but seldom keep track of the age
of the magnificent structures surrounding
us, till one day, they begin to show signs of
distress, and a witch-hunt begins to identify
a scapegoat! It was, therefore, a surprise
when that warm invitation came from the
engineering advisor to the Prime Minister AMITABHA
of Bangladesh. It was the centenary of the GHOSHAL
famed Hardinge Bridge (aka Sarah Bridge), (The author has engineered many bridges
across the lower Ganges. My association: I in India and abroad in a 60-year career.)
was the engineer entrusted with repair of
major damages inflicted on it during the 1971 war. An unusual
assignment, it had called for innovative solutions, and urge-
ntly—the railway bridge was the lifeline of a newborn country
recovering from war. Now, we got a fabulous reception,
including a trip to the bridge by a special train. Judged against
the utter negligence the engineering community suffers in
our country, being honoured thus was a dream come true.
A Bridge Between Yesterday, Tomorrow
Now Howrah Bridge, the silent hero of many a film, including
one by the same name, is completing 75 years. At a Victoria
Memorial seminar, I had occasion to slip into a rare retrospec-
tive mood, telling the story of a bridge. How many Calcuttans
remember this bridge was a replacement for one on floating
pontoons, designed by Sir Bradford Lesley? It had a remova-
ble central section to allow river traffic that fed Calcutta port!
Designed for a life of 25 years, it had to serve for 69 years, till
the “New Howrah Bridge”, as it was called then, was inaugu-
rated in 1943. The old one was struggling with the ever-grow-
ing traffic across the river to Howrah, which housed the main
railway station and was the gateway to Calcutta. It also had to
convey the raw material sourced from the rest of India for
Britain via the port, and the finished materials from the colo-
nial masters to the populace of the colony. It was the
main artery of empire, and it was choking! The
new bridge, therefore, was designed to
have a road carriageway of 71 feet,
enough to accommodate eight lanes of
traffic, including two tram tracks,
and, additionally, two 15-ft-wide
footways on either side, keeping in
view the huge pedestrian traffic
disgorged by the railway station.
The River, Right of Way
Interesting debates shaped the
new bridge. Port authorities vet-
oed a foundation inside the river
channel, fearing that would change
siltation patterns permanently and
affect ship movement. That dictated
the broad plan—the bridge was forced to
SAJITH KUMAR
74 OUTLOOK 30 April 2018
HOWRAH BRIDGE diary
have a span of 1,500 ft. The designers dec-
ided on a balanced cantilever suspension
bridge: a 1,500-ft-long ropeway of steel,
slung on two towers rising about 300 ft
above the ground on either side. A mam-
moth 26,500 tonnes of steel work! The
1,500 ft length has three parts. Two arms
of 470 ft each cantilevered from the tow-
ers—at a gentle slope of 1 in 40, to make it
easy for bullock carts and manual carts
that made up the bulk of traffic—which in
turn support a central suspended girder of
560 ft. The arms have two short anchor
spans, held down by massive concrete anchor blocks behind
each tower. If you stand bang in the centre, you may not real-
ise you’re being held aloft in the air by anchors 1,000 ft away!
Make in India 1.0
Stirrings against total domination by Britain too inflected this
essay in steel. The UK-based Cleveland Bridge, the selected
contractors, faced off against British-owned but Calcutta-
based structural fabrication companies, which insisted the
contract should not be awarded to any company from outside
India! The claim of the lowest tenderer from Germany was
brusquely dismissed because of the growing war clouds in
Europe. Finally, a compromise was arrived at: Cleveland
would get the construction contract, and the entire fabrica-
tion would be subcontracted to the ‘Indian’ players, who
merged to form ‘The Braithwaite, Burn & Jessop
Construction Co. (BBJ)’. The skills they picked up doing
Howrah Bridge allowed them to do almost all major steel
bridges across India and abroad for the next 60 years, includ-
ing the next bridge across the Hooghly, the Vidyasagar Setu.
We Also Make Steel
Then came steel—this needed ‘high tensile’ stuff, almost 1½
times stronger than what’s normally used, euphemisti-
cally called ‘mild steel’. It wasn’t manufactured in
India those days—but the Tatas put their foot
in the door and promised to upgrade!
Finally, 23,500 tonnes of the total 26,500
was forged at Jamshedpur. The founda-
tion work saw high-tech digging at lev-
els much below the river bed. They
were pioneers and martyrs diving
into aqua incognito: Bend Disease,
caused by the formation of nitrogen
bubbles in the bloodstream, felled a
few. When it was completed, on cue
within five years, it was the middle of
WWII. Howrah Bridge went under
the cover of barrage balloons to evade
Japanese bombs! It still eludes our atte-
ntion, Calcutta’s proud and silent icon,
uncorroded, a testimony to India’s skills.